Planning at the TEMPO of Change

By Larrywomack.com

The future is always a puzzle.  The TEMPO of Change is a process for pulling together the collective knowledge in an organization to complete the puzzle of its future.  With the world changing around you, the challenge is to maintain your competitive edge while the targets and business environment keep shifting.  Most organizations already have the knowledge required for effective planning and action.

Getting at and focusing that knowledge is often difficult because it is dispersed – in the heads of many different individuals and throughout many departments and functions.  The TEMPO process unleashes this hidden repository of knowledge and organizes it into useful information for planning, decision-making, and action.   TEMPO is an acronym for:

Technology – The technological advances that will most likely have the biggest impact on the organization from both marketing and operational perspectives.

Economy  – The potential swings of the economy that may affect the sales of products and services and the availability of resources required for growth.

Market – The external and internal factors that will drive or thwart increases in sales and market share including trends, R&D, competitive moves, and customer demands.

Politics – The dynamic of the political environment including congressional actions, global issues, party power shifts, and industry challenges.

Organization – The internal attitudes, abilities, and dynamics that will impact the organization’s ability to respond appropriately to opportunities and challenges.

An organization’s ability to predict the speed and impact of the TEMPO factors determines the quality of the decisions and effectiveness of its plans for the future.

The key benefit to engaging in the TEMPO process is unlocking this hidden knowledge resource and releasing its pent-up potential.  Like splitting the atom, it can unleash an awesome energy force. 
The distinct advantages provided from engaging in the TEMPO process include:

  • Tapping and harnessing the valuable knowledge that exists throughout the organization.
  • Fast action through an accelerated, structured, collaborative process (6–12 weeks).
  • Thoughtful, organized analysis that allows for revision and tightening the focus as you go.
  • Beats the alternatives:
  1. Doing nothing.
  2. Protracted formalized planning processes that divert attention from the work at hand.
  3. Linear planning – just extrapolating what you did last year.
  4. Hiring an outside expert to tell you what to do.

TEMPO is not a canned solution brought in from industry or other subject matter experts who may be biased or give essentially the same advice to everyone, including competitors.  Your TEMPO coordinator takes you through a dynamic process in which you become trained to harness the vast reservoir of knowledge within your organization and apply it as you see fit.  You never lose control.  The TEMPO process is an orderly way to address the future through the focused vision of the best people in your organization.

TEMPO is a non-intrusive process that involves everyone with useful knowledge, but still leaves managers and staff free to perform current duties.  TEMPO starts by asking people what they think and ends with consensus around the best ideas.  A modified Delphi process with three phases, it starts broadly by collecting information, valuing it, and then establishing a collaborative context in which to apply it.