Experience Curve

You Profit from Our Experience

After working more than one hundred successful organizational changes over the last thirty years, we are high in change competence and experience (or, technically speaking, very low on the experience curve which shows the course of progress made in learning something*).

Our client-facing consultants have one or more advanced degrees and more than 20 years of business experience. The average age of our consultants working on a client project is over 50. Our varied industry experience gives us objectivity and insight that few other consultants have.

We know that most companies have been “making changes” for decades. But most of those companies have not conducted a study of how the change process works in an organization. Odds are that your company is now consciously building its change expertise … and you are doing it the only way you can … one change at a time. We have built our experience and competence the same way … and we are fortunate to have a thirty plus year head start. The head start counts because mastering a technical field like change management “takes roughly a decade of heavy labor.”**

When the business change you want to make is critical to your company’s success, you always have choices …

1. go with your company’s experience curve … or with ours
2. go it alone and learn as you go … or go it with us and learn from our pros
3. practice on your next big organizational change … or put the experienced resources in place to ensure success while your build your expertise

Reasons for the Learning Curve Effect at H&D

Besides the sheer volume of change initiatives we have completed, there are other factors that have allowed us to max the experience curve.

1. Optimized Change Designs/Models – we have learned over the years and researched best practices to know there are only a few “fundamental types of change” that can be made with business organizations. We have tailored our change methods and models to optimize each type of change. Examples include: 

   A. Changing a company’s strategy
   B. Integrating an organization after merger/acquisition
   C. Reengineering core work processes
   D. Inserting and integrating new technology  
   E. Changing the corporate culture, etc.
   

We have learned the right change pathways to take … as well as the “sand traps” to avoid.

2. Standardization, specialization, and methods improvements - As we complete more and more change, we gain knowledge and our methods and undergo constant enhancement. Our methods have been battlefield tested and are not found wanting. Our methods are copyrighted, and we have a string of patent applications working its way through USPTO.***
   
   
3. Open Minds and Open methodologies – Our proven methods are based on core principles that we adjust to fit our client’s specific and unique situation. That’s right, we flex our methodologies around the client and not the other way around. Our consultants know change and they can handle a company’s change situation (or internal change methodology), much like a surgeon can go into an OR anywhere in the world and make safe and effective surgery happen.
   
   
4. Better use of technology, tools, and automation – With experience in hundreds of changes, we have developed automated change tools that make change easier to see, easier to learn, and easier to follow-up on (all our tools, by the way, are on Microsoft Office or in Microsoft Project). No exotica required.
   
   
5. Accumulated Tools – We don’t throw anything away when it comes to unique tools we have developed to help our clients make successful changes. Our consultants have more than 1,000 tools available to them on-line anywhere in the world.
   
   
6. Changes in the resource mix – We know what mix of H&D consultants will be most complementary and productive in certain kinds of changes. And we know who to ask for inside our client companies to provide the industry and business expertise to go with our change leadership.
   
   
7. Shared experience effects - Experience curve effects have been reinforced when different H&D consultants were mixed together. Each consultant’s unique business journey over more than 20 years provides ingredients for a rich brew of business, organizational and change savvy.

* The learning/experience curve concept was introduced by Wright in 1936...the same year our founder was born.

** The general rule of expertise was developed in the 1960’s by Dr. Herbert Simon of Carnegie Melon University

*** After all these years in change, why are we just now patenting our methods? … because until recently, USPTO did not give patents on “business processes.”