Hi Sobin—

You can find lots of information on value chains on the web.  Here are three sources:

The value chain, also known as value chain analysis, is a concept from business management that was first described and popularized by Michael Porter in his 1985 best-seller, Competitive Advantage: Creating and Sustaining Superior Performance.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Value_chain

The sequence of activities that a firm undertakes to create value, including the various steps of the supply chain but also additional activities, such as marketing, sales, and service. Term due to Porter (1990) and used by Krugman in slicing up the value chain.
www-personal.umich.edu/~alandear/glossary/v.html

The sequential set of primary and support activities that an enterprise performs to turn inputs into value-added outputs for its external customers. ...
http://www.ichnet.org/glossary.htm

Hope this helps,

Tammy

Filed under: Talent Management Approaches | Published: 01/15/11

Hi Tim—

Understandably, I’m a big proponent of the tool that came out of our research on employee engagement.  We found that different people care deeply about different values in the workplace—that work plays different roles in individuals’ lives—and that understanding those values is essential.  Learning “what it means to work here” for your current employees provides great guidance for thinking about how you might want to change the existing culture—do you want to change the fundamental values (possible, but difficult) or do you want to develop a contemporary reinterpretation of the values that exist within your current employee population?  When you’re integrating either individuals or entire companies, it’s essential to understand what work means to them—and therefore how they will respond to the characteristics of the employee experience you offer.

We licensed the tool that was developed out of this research (which can assess your employee population against six value archetypes) to Profiles International.  I also do a lot of this work today using online focus groups—a guided discussion, which I find produces an excellent understanding of the core values in the culture.

My HBR article “What It Means to Work Here” discusses these concepts in more detail.

I hope this helps.

Warmly,

Tammy

Filed under: Talent Management Approaches | Published: 01/15/11

Get good at project-based work. Figure out how to use contractors, how to let employees work 3 months on and 3 off. Our research shows that that’s in more demand than, say, a 4-day week. And both young and old—over 55 and under 35—are demanding it. Make sure you’re able to make the smartest use of people who want to work differently—because there’s no escaping that many are going to work differently.

Filed under: Talent Management Approaches | Published: 10/17/08