Culture Eats Strategy for Lunch March 19, 2009

Lessons learned from Hewlett Packard, Business Objects, and SAP
As months go by in this recession, executives and their organizations are faced with more constraints thanin recent memory. Breakthrough strategies that were seen as critical for growth are getting bogged down. Past methods for mobilizing the organization - hiring new leaders, adding new teams, reorganizing are not as viable. Job and program eliminations are being done very carefully, as competitors are launching new strategies. Waiting has its own peril as it can leave the organization with fewer choices as it reacts to the unexpected.

And yet choosing something proactive is what must be done. Hewlett Packard had to do something. HP has changed and evolved through countless strategies of its own, from decentralization to centralization, creation and elimination of business units, invention of new disruptive technologies and reinventing itself through acquisitions. But one thing HP has done is to characterize its own culture and seek to alter it, even in downturns as it has remade its business countless times to stabilize losses, retake the lead and ultimately increase profitability and growth. Business Objects was another company that knew its core business was slowing. It had to do something different to reinvent itself into new adjacent markets and with new technologies and relationships.

Using the lessons from HP and Business Objects and several other leading technology companies, come learn a framework, tools and steps to:

* Apply a leading methodology to assess your culture's ability to rethink itself in this economy
* Internalize what leading organizations do that enables them to consistently transform themselves
* Discuss practical examples of what worked and lesson's learned in altering a culture
* Leave with ideas and steps on what you can do influence your culture systemically and how you can go about it

$25 members, students, affiliates, $35 all others. At door $35 members, students, affiliates, $45 all others,.

Official Website: http://www.strategyplus.org/chapters/NorthernCalifornia.php