You will hear a lecturer discussing four values commonly associated with business.
First, you have some time to look at questions 31 to 40.
Now listen carefully and answer questions 31 to 40.
When people discuss business, they often assume that certain values are unquestionably desirable.
Today I'll consider four of them – collaboration, industriousness, creativity and excellence.
Most of us would describe all four as positive, but I want to argue that the reality is less simple.
The difficulty is that these values are abstract ideas and can become detached from what happens in a company from day to day.
Organisations can certainly pursue them, but they must anticipate the consequences.
Although nobody intends it, applying these values may actually cause damage.
Senior managers normally want to make sound decisions.
Yet the apparent right choice can produce the opposite result when leaders adopt a value without recognising and controlling its side effects.
In practice, the value may obstruct the very objective it was meant to support.
Let's begin with collaboration.
I once attended a management course where participants were divided into teams and asked to construct a bridge over a stream using a set of building blocks.
One rule required every team member to move at least one block during construction, supposedly to promote teamwork.
In fact, one person could perform the task far more effectively.
The other groups tried to make every decision together and quickly fell into confusion, with people obstructing one another.
Our leader handled the challenge cleverly.
She had each member shift a block a few centimetres to satisfy the rule, then allowed the person who was best at puzzles to finish the structure alone.
The lesson is that the task did not suit collaboration, so imposing teamwork made little sense.
Collaboration can also produce an inconsistent product, which often damages sales.
One company launched a smartphone while two directors pursued conflicting markets.
One wanted business customers.
The other insisted on ordinary consumers.
To involve them both, the company selected a consumer-style name but promoted the phone to businesses.
It appealed fully to neither group.
Allowing either director to follow a single strategy would have been more effective.
The second value is industriousness, or hard work.
It's easy to joke about people who emphasise how hard they work.
A hamster runs continuously in its wheel, but never advances.
Effort is valuable only when directed well.
Otherwise, it consumes the company resources that matter most, time and energy, without benefiting the organisation.
One management model places people into categories using four qualities – clever, hard-working, stupid and lazy.
In this model, being lazy means making a rational choice not to perform unnecessary tasks.
It does not mean refusing to work.
Most people combine two qualities, and the most useful employees are both clever and lazy.
They think clearly and avoid rushing into decisions.
Instead of adding more working hours to a problem, they seek a solution that saves the time and energy wasted by people who work hard without thinking effectively.
We now turn to creativity.
An inventive television advertisement may attract attention and increase sales.
But originality does not always deliver a commercial result.
Some campaigns remain in people's memories while doing nothing for the product.
This occurred during the launch of a chocolate bar.
Later research found that many consumers remembered the advertisements but could not identify what had been advertised.
The creator enjoyed developing the concept and wrongly assumed the audience would respond in the same way.
A business that releases thousands of products may appear more creative than one producing only a handful, yet excessive creativity can reduce profits.
Creative work should be directed towards solving a specific problem the company has identified.
Producing an endless stream of novel items is not automatically useful.
The final value is excellence.
Many companies claim that they pursue it, but achieving excellence takes time.
In business, introducing the first version of a product can be more profitable than offering the finest version.
A major performance study compared pioneers, the firms that launched a product first, with followers that copied and improved it.
On average, pioneers secured a market share of 29%, while followers achieved just 13%, less than half as much even when the later product was superior.
Requiring excellence in every activity consumes time and energy and may cause a company to miss opportunities.
Work that is merely adequate can sometimes be more valuable than perfect work.
Telling people to make everything excellent may sound sensible, but beginning promptly is often the more successful approach.
