Consultant Asserts the Obvious
March 20, 2011
Years ago, I worked at the former blue chip consulting firm Booz, Allen & Hamilton. At that time, the firm was generating studies of world economic change, updates to the definitive discussion of new product development, and ground breaking studies in technical innovation methods. Now we learn that executives are distracted. Okay.
I learned about this obvious statement in “Executives Say They’re Pulled in Too Many Directions, According to Booz & Co. Survey.” According to the write up:
“The survey results tell us that deciding on priorities is a huge issue for companies – and that actually linking priorities to decisions is a hurdle that few companies get past. We see this ‘incoherent’ operating environment across industries and geographies, among all types of companies. It’s draining – and forcing companies to pay a significant penalty. We call it the incoherence penalty,” said Paul Leinwand, co-author of the just-released book “The Essential Advantage: How to Win with a Capabilities-Driven Strategy” (Harvard Business Review Press, December 2010).
When I read this, I thought about the type of research and marketing that consulting firms are forced to do to maintain their revenues. Some firms have become more like boutique marketing shops. Others are emulating PageRank and looking for topics that generate clicks. Booz seems to be blazing a path by putting numbers behind what most business professionals know. In a meeting, no one pays much attention. Distractions are the name of the game. People come and go, and most don’t know anything about Michelangelo.
I relate almost every thing I read to search and information access. I wonder how distracted executives can make good decisions. I thought about consulting firms trying to sell obvious generalizations to procurement teams more interested in fiddling with iPhones than figuring out whether the technical explanations were on point or even accurate.
The Booz study offers some evidence that we live in a PageRank world. No wonder it is hard to find valid, useful, substantive, actionable information.
Stephen E Arnold, March 20, 2011
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