Comments on: Fixing the diffusion-poor company http://leadonpurposeblog.com/2008/09/24/fixing-the-diffusion-poor-company/ Promoting Leadership Principles in Product Management Sat, 11 Feb 2012 14:42:06 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.com/ By: Val Workman http://leadonpurposeblog.com/2008/09/24/fixing-the-diffusion-poor-company/#comment-531 Tue, 03 Feb 2009 13:27:24 +0000 http://leadonpurpose.wordpress.com/?p=268#comment-531 Being diffusion-poor is an organizational disease. I believe that a Product Manager who exercises good leadership practices and performs the duties of the “idea evangelist “can go a long way in keeping an organization healthy. Much like sleep, lots of water, vitamins, and fresh air prevents other diseases; the idea evangelist is good preventative medicine. But once sick, I have to wonder if being an idea evangelist is enough to “Fix” the company. Someone once stated that all the good attitude in the world won’t build a nuclear reactor. You also need some skills. Any ideas about what leadership skills the Product Manager must have to cure the diffusion-poor organization?

I suggest that this is a much bigger problem than you hinted at. Many organizations aren’t able to align day-to-day tactics with product strategy. Many Product Mangers don’t even participate in the development and modification to product strategy. In this case, all they can do is respond to the changes made by others. Execution of a plan requires skills, maybe those skills are missing, and maybe the plan is missing. Many times the Product Manager hasn’t socialized the roadmap at all. What can the Product Manager do to cure the disease?

I’ve observed that being diffusion-poor can be either a disease or a symptom; sometimes both. This just adds to the issue. What happens when the effects of poor ideation and / or poor conversion cause a diffusion poor diagnose? In this situation, the product manager can be doing everything right in the diffusion area and still be diffusion poor. Any efforts trying to fix the diffusion poor condition would have no effects.

I think to have a good diagnoses, a sensitivity test would have to be completed to determine what was truly the constraint.

]]> By: David Locke http://leadonpurposeblog.com/2008/09/24/fixing-the-diffusion-poor-company/#comment-529 Tue, 03 Feb 2009 02:40:23 +0000 http://leadonpurpose.wordpress.com/?p=268#comment-529 Radical or discontinous innovation is seen as being a high risk proposition. This perception developed, because the methods underlying commodity goods marketing is not diffusion. Geoffrey Moore laid out the technology adoption lifecycle as a diffusion mechanism. Christensen’s approach to radical or discontinous innovation has not been accepted by traditional management either. A few companies take those approaches. Most don’t and will not, because they are radical innovations in themselves. Gary Hamel in his “The Future of Management,” talks about the need for management innovation. But, it will only be the early adopter, high risk tolerant, manager that will move towards a management innovation before it is commoditized. It will be these managers that enable the diffusion capable company.

]]>