From Melodymasterplatts

I just read an interesting post from Seth Godin relating to someone wondering if it’s possible to succeed and to stay clean.

In fact, I believe there will always be unethical people trying to succeed even if they have to consider unethical things. Just let these people live their life; this is not a good long term strategy anyway.

In fact, my father told me once: Cyril, do not be too nice (gullible). When I was younger I was considering everybody as nice. You travel, you meet people, you get older and you realize that mostly people would not hesitate to destroy you if they need it to succeed. Fortunately, some people have ethical spirit.

I strongly believe that we can succeed being respectful, honest and nice. Nice does not mean gullible, it means being listening to people, understanding, considering people as human. However do not be stupid. People easily forget that you were there for them. Live your life on your own and when someone really deserves your help, you will naturally feel it. If I succeed, I won’t succeed alone, but people would have deserved it.

(Sorry no time to record a video ;))

I am currently reading an interesting working paper from Laurence Lehmann-Ortega, Business model: from buzz word to managerial tool.

As I am working on it, I still need time to completely catch this concept and I will probably complete these words.

Nowadays, it seems that traditional strategy concepts need to be reconsidered. In fact, environment is now on a perpetual change due to new information technology. Companies need pragmatism, flexibility and reactivity. It seems that a new strategy analysis unit is needed to face this changing environment on a realistic way. Nowadays, we cannot consider a global “screenshot” of the competitive environment as it is changing all the time.

Business model could pertinently complete strategy concepts adding a customer-focused side to the theory (contrary to an environment-focused concept). Thus, we consider here the generated value for customers before considering competitors: customer is now central.

To make it short, we could describe business model as it follows:

Value proposition (products /services, customer segment) > Value architecture (resources, internal/external value chain) > Revenue model (cost structure, value capture)

To combine business model and strategy concepts (competitive analysis, key competences) permits a complete overview of the company. The manager is then able to consider the company’s development guideline on the best way.

A successful manager has a transversal view of the company, considering each dimension: marketing, finance, production, administration… I would say that the hardest thing here is not to understand these concepts; it is to manage these concepts on an operational way.