Insights · Articles, newsletter, podcasts and videos
Ideas for building organisations that work right first time.
Alex’s newsletter on designing, building and running the connected organisation. Sent by email, shared on LinkedIn and archived here.
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Articles
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Building for AI right first time
My view on what Ireland’s AI plans mean for anyone running a business, and how I’d approach it.
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What Ireland’s AI plans mean for your business
What Ireland’s national digital and AI strategy and Enterprise Ireland’s Make AI Work guide say for businesses.
Newsletter · Past editions
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Understand Before You Acquire: Designing Mergers and Acquisitions That Work
Ireland’s IT services sector is consolidating fast. Most buyers judge a target on strategy, the balance sheet and the customer list. Far fewer ask how well the two businesses will actually work together, and that is where much of the value is lost.
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Why most organisations are never designed, and what to do about it
Imagine being handed a thousand-piece jigsaw with no picture on the box. You’d still make progress, but sooner or later you’d find sections that wouldn’t join up. That’s how most organisations are built.
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Who Designed Your Organisation?
The question “Who designed your organization?” sounds as though it should have a straightforward answer. In a young business, the answer might appear to be the founder. In a larger organization, it might be the chief executive, the executive team…
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Concurrent Management
Concurrent Management addresses one of the fundamental problems of traditional organisations: functions acting independently and creating business silos. It provides the means to manage those functions as co-dependent parts of the enterprise, working together for the benefit of the whole.…
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Who actually owns how your business works?
Most organisations are built around a sensible assumption: hire strong people, organise them into strong functions, put capable managers in charge, and you should end up with a strong business. But there is a problem. Your customers, work and information…
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The Integrated Execution Governance Architecture
Why cross-functional alignment needs a system, not a personality trait Most organizations treat collaboration as a personality trait — something certain people are just good at. Structured collaboration treats it as a discipline: a deliberate system of roles, rhythms and…
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You bought the Enterprise level platform. So why are the numbers still in spreadsheets?
We’re recently designed and delivered an integrated performance dashboard for a client — a single executive view rolling up the full Lead to Cash process end to end: marketing, sales, pre-sales, PMO, operations and finance, with drill-down into each. The…
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The capability mix every growing business needs!
Successful scaling depends on having the right blend of management capability: People who can manage a function They bring stability, discipline and consistency. People who can build and develop a function They create the structures, processes, technologies and clarity needed…
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Structured Collaboration on a Page
A one-page visual summary.
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When nobody owns process, everybody owns the chaos.
There’s a particular kind of organisational dysfunction that rarely shows up in board decks. It doesn’t have a line on the P&L. Nobody calls it out in the all-hands. But you feel it everywhere. Decisions loop back. Work gets redone.…
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Fixing What’s Broken Isn’t Enough
One of the great misconceptions in management is the belief that organisational excellence comes from fixing what is broken. It does not! Fixing problems may restore performance temporarily, but it rarely creates the operating conditions required for sustainable excellence. As…
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Masters Tip #1: If Bob Rotella was coaching Managers……….
There is a paradox at the heart of performance that most managers never fully resolve. The more you focus on results, the less likely you are to achieve them. And yet, in most organisations, results dominate the conversation—targets, metrics, KPIs,…
Listen and watch
Podcasts, interviews and talks.
Alex talking about operational excellence, SME recovery and the future of productivity.
Podcast · October 2023
Operational excellence in the service sector
Alex on the Business Innovation podcast: what operational excellence means when the work is service and knowledge work, not manufacturing.
Radio · 2020
Tipp FM, Tipp Today
As an SME Recovery Ireland local leader, Alex explains the SME Recovery Plan and what it means for small businesses.
Radio · October 2020
Community Radio Kilkenny City
Start Me Up Business: Alex on SME recovery and helping small firms get back on their feet. His interview starts at 27:30.
Webinar · Video
The future of GBS productivity
Alex joins Mark Downey to discuss how Global Business Services organisations can raise productivity.
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