^The APQC Blog

I’m sure you’ve heard about health care reform <grin>, but I think we are missing the bigger picture.

The main point supported by the Supreme Court is about universal coverage—whether it is Constitutional to require all Americans to buy health insurance. I’m sure health care reform will continue to be contested politically, as well as legally, but there are much larger forces upsetting the health care industry, and they are driven by the major payors.

For professional services firms, knowing what clients value in a consulting firm—and crafting the message accordingly—can be the difference between winning and losing an engagement. To that end, APQC asked senior procurement and C-level executives to prioritize what they value when hiring a consultant and the takeaways couldn’t be clearer.

Priority #1: Experience

Participate in APQC’s “War for Finance Talent” Survey: Are You Prepared? and find out how your organization compares to others in attracting and retaining finance talent. The impending loss of intellectual capital that will occur when the baby boomers begin to retire in droves is, and will continue to be, a top concern for CFOs.

If you haven’t had a chance to check out APQC’s newest product development best practices report, Improving the Flow of Knowledge in Product Development, we’ve made it easy to get an overview of the report’s findings.

Take our new Employee Wellness Program Assessment. Then, find improvement ideas using APQC’s Employee Health and Wellness Resource Collection.

Nearly a year has passed since my last blog post on employee wellness programs. As June is National Employee Wellness Month* in the United States, I want to share some of the research that I have come across since my last post on this topic.

How does your organization measure quality? Is it an enterprise-wide concern?

APQC recently researched how to use enterprise quality measurement to drive business value. We found that there are 12 emerging practices that exemplary organizations are leveraging to get even better results. In addition, there are 19 key foundational practices required to implement and maintain a stable and effective quality measurement system.

Is your organization among the many that are struggling to fill technical jobs?

APQC members can download a recording and the slides from the June APQC/AME Benchmarking CoP Webinar.

Recently, I spoke on the phone with Jonathan Schiff, president of Schiff Consulting Group, about talent development within finance organizations. Schiff points out that “finance staff are being asked to do many more things with fewer people because of the headcount reductions that took place during the recession. At the same time, more key people in senior level positions are choosing to leave. They’re not going to another company – they’re really looking to retire early in their late-fifties or early-sixties.” The stresses of the job have become untenable for many.

Recently, a lot of people have been asking me about the best way to transfer best practices. APQC has tons of content on this topic, but I realized we didn’t have an updated overview article that lays out the basics, so I wrote one: How to Transfer Internal Best Practices. The article is based on our collaborative research as well as what we’ve learned working with clients, and it contains a great example from Alcoa World Alumina.