Hi ,

Welcome to our third newsletter of 2010.

Management Brief: Business Process Outsourcing
Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) involves sub-contracting business functions and processes to an external service provider. BPO offers potential cost savings to organisations, as well as introducing fresh expertise, best-in-class practices, and state-of-the-art technologies, all of which lead to competitive advantages. New entrant operations can be placed on an equal footing with more mature organisations by engaging third-party vendors that are able to offer incremental cost structures, sophisticated services, and proven implementation records. For many organisations, BPO is used as a strategic initiative, which can then be further developed and enhanced as appropriate........ read more.

Read other management briefs

Watch pre-recorded webinar on “Business Excellence and Benchmarking - A Global Perspective”
This webinar was delivered by Dr Robin Mann on 8 April in Toronto, Canada. As the Chairman of the Global Benchmarking Network and Chief Expert for business excellence for the Asian Productivity Organisation’s recent research project on the status of business excellence, Robin was in a unique position to provide a global perspective on business excellence and benchmarking.

Robin’s presentation drew from three projects:

• A research project on behalf of the Asian Productivity Organisation in 2009 to identify the value and impact of business excellence. Five countries participated in the research; India, Japan, Singapore, Taiwan, and Thailand.
• A research project on behalf of the Global Benchmarking Network in 2008 to investigate awareness, use and benefits of benchmarking. Over 40 countries were represented.
• A research project on behalf of SAI Global in 2006 to review and update the Australian business excellence framework. This project has the involvement of 16 countries.

To watch the recording visit the following URL: http://connectpro24581019.acrobat.com/p54078139/
Access the recorded session with the following information:

Username: This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it
Password: bench

Thank you to the National Quality Institute, Canada, www.nqi.ca, for allowing BPIR Newsletter readers to watch the webinar.

Spotlight on Self-Assessment
Have you used any of our self-assessment tools lately? We have over 50 to assess all aspects of your organisation - from how your organisation develops its strategy to how it serves its customers. Here are three typical examples:

Is Your Organisation in an Innovation Rut? – Assess your innovation culture..... read more (go to category 6)
Supply Chain Management – How well do you manage your supply chain?.... read more (go to category 6)
Project Management – Do you need training in project management?.....read more (go to category 6)

Featured publications
Did you know BPIR provides full access to over 600 excellent business publications providing, in total, over 1,000,000 articles and reports? Here are a few of the publication titles from the "Management" category (one of 23 categories):

Members read the latest issues - non members see available titles

Code of conduct wins awards

Cisco wrote its code of conduct in a conversational tone similar to one employee speaking with another. The format was enhanced using quick-read call-out-boxes to help employees to identify with the code. “Learn-More” links provided more detailed policy and `What If` scenarios addressed Cisco-specific issues. Cisco’s ethics programme was aimed at its global and highly technical workforce. An ethics Idol` series of four, fun modules, introduced an animated `contestant` who told the story of his or her ethical dilemma via action-packed visuals and witty song parodies......read more

Lean manufacturing dramatically improves productivity

Cadco Ltd was experiencing inventory control and time consuming assembly problems. Initial advice, which was sceptically received from a lean consultant, produced an immediate 60% improvement in productivity which convinced Cadco owners to go further. Cadco continued by adopting a flexible production schedule, and mapped out strategies to enable customer orders to be taken swiftly and then to efficiently schedule production requirements. The plant layout was improved, inventory was eliminated, and additional work throughput was easily absorbed by....... Cadco also began to incorporate lean thinking into its administrative office work to cut customer order lead times from four weeks to an expected five days......read more

Social networking helps company get a foot in the door

Training & development programme takes graduates to middle management positions

BPIR - what's been happening?

New member’s area to be launched – Try it out! – After a lot of hard work we are pleased to announce the launch of the new member’s area of the BPIR.com. By the time you read this or soon after you will notice its new fresh look. It will have clear buttons showing where you can go and what you can do. This new design will help users to understand the difference between the various searches and types of information we have – we realized that in the past the amount of information we have can be quite overwhelming! This much simpler approach will enable you to quickly decide whether or not you want to search our Information databases or Network with our other members. We hope you will like it – let us have your feedback!

Networking taking off – With the new design we are expecting our networking area to become much more popular. Already we have over 400 member profiles created and these people, from more than 20 different countries, are now talking to each other, making new contacts, finding synergies, and benefiting from being able to plug in, whenever they like, to a group of business improvement focussed individuals. Have you created your own member profile yet? Tried out the contact mechanisms? If you have any issue in the business performance area on which you could do with some help, some objective opinion, or just need someone to bounce ideas off, then just plug in to the network and reach out.

Example: Recently I received a contact from a manager in Singapore who was having a real struggle managing several remote teams. Over a series of emails which then quickly developed into a Skype conference call with a few others in our networks we not only provided effective assistance but we all learned something valuable from the experience and also made some excellent contacts / potential colleagues / clients / customers..

Remember
..to check out the website keep in touch with other members through the network and view the rest of our research. There are 1000's of case studies, research papers, and 'expert' articles linked to over 1000 strategies, tools and techniques. More and more are added each month. We know you will find valuable knowledge and we always welcome your feedback, so if you have time, please email any comments about our services to This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it , or simply fill in and submit our 30 second survey found under "Newsletters-subscribe".

And if you are currently not a member of the BPIR, or wish to upgrade your membership to a site-wide membership, then we encourage you to do so right now.. JOIN NOW.. you won’t be disappointed.

Hi, Welcome to our newsletter.
Management Brief: Employee Motivation
Developing well motivated employees leads to more satisfied customers and higher sales, and this in turn leads to greater employee motivation - creating a virtuous circle. Highly motivated employees are likely to be engaged employees who are willing to go the extra mile with customers, and to reward their employers with their loyalty, high levels of productivity, and greater innovation. An excellent workplace environment will attract talented workers who will invariably reward the organisation with superior performance, excellent customer service, and top products.......read more.
Read other management briefs

Benchmarking for Breakthrough Improvements in Glasgow, London, Abu Dhabi, Bahrain, Singapore, Kuwait, and Auckland
The Centre for Organisational Excellence Research (COER) offers a unique 2-day interactive workshop in TRADE best practice benchmarking. This methodology is now promoted and used in over 10 countries – it delivers innovative and breakthrough improvements leading to major financial benefits for organizations. It offers the first certification scheme for benchmarking – ensuring participants are professionally trained and reap the rewards from benchmarking. For more information and a flyer visit COER’s website http://www.coer.org.nz/trade#workshop or email Dr Robin Mann via This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it

Starring Role in Newsletter and the BPIR For Your Company?
Currently we are researching material for the next Management Briefs that will focus upon Succession Planning and Business Process Outsourcing.  Have you or your company an experience/story concerning Succession Planning, Business Process Outsourcing, or any closely related topic?  If so please write to us at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it to arrange a phone call, or just attach it.  We will edit it if necessary to suit our style and then add it to the BPIR databases for all our members to read.  If its captivating enough then it will feature in the next newsletter!

Spotlight on Self-Assessment
Have you used any of our self-assessment tools lately? We have over 50 to assess all aspects of your organisation - from how your organisation develops its strategy to how it serves its customers. Here are three topical examples:

Performance Coaching – Rate your coaching skills..... read more (go to category 7)
Delegation Self-assessment – How well do you delegate?.... read more (go to category 7)
Organisation Culture – Assess your organisation's culture.....read more (go to category 1)

Featured publications
Did you know BPIR provides full access to over 600 excellent business publications providing, in total, over 1,000,000 articles and reports? Here are a few of the publication titles from the "Management" category (one of 23 categories):

Members read the latest issues - non members see available titles

Research study: Core Competence - developing the ability to think strategically

To identify specific experiences that contribute to the development of an individual's ability to think strategically a questionnaire was completed in 2008/2009 by 207 executives who attended American College of Healthcare Executives educational events. The work and educational experiences that contributed to the development of an individual’s ability to think strategically were identified and are ranked in order of importance as:

A. Work Experiences that helped develop ability to think strategically:

Research study: Core competence - Innovation skills can be learned

A six year study concluded in 2009 by Harvard Business School, Insead and Brigham Young University involved over 3000 executives, 500 innovative entrepreneurs, and interviews with high-profile entrepreneurs. The research concluded that innovation was not an inherent trait, but a set of skills that anyone can learn. Five skills that separated blue-sky innovators from the rest were identified as:

1. Associating: The ability to connect seemingly unrelated questions, problems or ideas from different fields.

Case study: Sustainable Development project delivers cost savings & creates a new product

Case study: Communities of Practice facilitate army base camp development

Remember
..to check out the website keep in touch with other members through the network and view the rest of our research. There are 1000's of case studies, research papers, and 'expert' articles linked to over 1000 strategies, tools and techniques. More and more are added each month. We know you will find valuable knowledge and we always welcome your feedback, so if you have time, please email any comments about our services to This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it , or simply fill in and submit our 30 second survey found under "Newsletters-subscribe".

And if you are currently not a member of the BPIR, or wish to upgrade your membership to a site-wide membership, then we encourage you to do so right now.. JOIN NOW.. you won’t be disappointed.