Paralysis by Fearor

How to Profit From the Crisis

Dr. Jan Mrazek

President, Adastra Group

Slide 22

Paralysis by Fear: History

� People are often paralyzed by the fear of things

outside their normal experience.

� 1519: Hernán Cortés lands in Mexico. Surprised

and frightened by horsemen and cannon,

Montezuma, the emperor of Tenochtitlan, the

greatest city-state of the time, sent gifts and

refused to face the intruder until it was too late.

� 1910: Halley’s Comet makes one of its regular

visits to the Earth. After news reports of deadly

gases from the comet’s tail, there is widespread

panic: suicides, farmers and miners refusing to

work, people buying “comet pills” to counter any

effects of the comet…

� 2009: reacting to reports of an economic

recession…

Slide 33

The New Economic Disorder

� For many sectors, the news is alarming:

home foreclosures, bank failures,

unemployment, automotive industry

meltdown, etc.

� Terms such as “downturn,” “recession,”

“depression” fill the daily news media.

� Will the economy recover? When?

Slide 44

How Executives Are Responding

� Fear makes things worse

� The fear of economic disaster has exacerbated the economic downturn

� Reduced budgets, concentrated decision-making

� Tighter internal budgets concentrate decision-making power into a few hands

� Key positions eliminated or temporarily stripped of their decision-making power

� Communication vacuum undermines productivity

� For example, decisions on layoffs and restructuring are made by a limited circle,

and are released only at the last minute

� Organizations are PARALYZED BY FEAR

� Prone to making costly mistakes, they show signs of being unable to capitalize on

opportunities inherent to a shifting economic situation.

Slide 55

New Economic Opportunities

� Services cost less

� Wider availability of skilled service

professionals

� Consider new engagement models with

vendors:� offshoring

� outsourcing

� cost sharing

� Forward-thinking, creative executives can

make a difference� capture market share

� make important changes to business

processes and structures.

� EXAMPLE: Wal-Mart’s continued success

through their competitive advantage, in part

due to robust Business Intelligence systems.

Slide 66

Meeting the Challenge

� How to sell a solution internally and get budget

approval in the face of cuts:

� Reform the approval process

� Traditional approval processes do not work well, even in

good times.

� Develop responsive projects

� Include end users in decisions

� New alliances internally

� Right-thinking leaders

� New vendor alliances

� Expertise and resources to develop solutions that will prove

value in the short term, and keep producing value into the

long term.

� Cost effective alternative to costly internal teams

� Fear must be met with creativity, grit and determination.

Slide 77

Leadership Through Crisis

� Leaders are made by meeting challenges,

not by managing them.

� Bold and timely action is rewarded by:

� higher market share

� higher value for new investments

� increased individual visibility

� Return on investments made during the

crisis will be much higher than on

investments made later.

� Many opportunities in

Business Intelligence

� Benefits:

� Sufficient, timely, and

quality data

� Quality analysis

proactive BI

� Organizations harnessing

better BI will emerge the

winners.

Slide 88

Thank you…

ADASTRA GROUP Europe

Karolinská 654/2

186 00 Praha 8

Tel.: +420 271 733 303

info@adastragrp.com

ADASTRA GROUP North America

8500 Leslie St., Suite 600

Markham, Ontario, L3T 7M8

Tel: +1 905 881 7946

info@adastragrp.com