All is growing well in California following the substantial rains during the winter and spring everything in the garden is growing and blooming.

The same applies in our Reclipse World. I like to call it “moving into the light”. It is exciting times with our Reclipse team and key partnerships building with experienced and innovative top talent and real pragmatic Vision to Action programs. We are developing both internally to fertilize our growth and externally as we prepare and present “value proposition” offerings for clients and potential new clients.

Exciting – Next Generation

It is a fact that most things we currently work on are confidential and we pride ourselves in working ahead of current curves to help our clients be the “Best Next”! Personally I really dislike the terms like “Best in Class” and “Benchmarking” as that really means trying to catch up and become normal or true examples of JIT vs. JIC vs. JTL (Just Too Late)

An Example: Apple and the iPod, iTunes, iPhone current realities really were “game changing” thought leadership and innovation to action and world changing success! Now the iPad has instantly become a “fashion statement” that sells like hot cakes and has created a whole new product, market and community category.

At Reclipse we prefer to work on innovating and creating “next generation” happenings for and with our clients.

Exciting – An all Electric Vehicle

One project I can mention is in our Sustainability, Clean and Green, category. This is a Company that has built a “Zero Emissions” electric vehicle that charges rapidly, has a long range between charges and can and does drive on the freeway as it goes fast enough to be able to. We are developing the Vision (s), Mission, Values, Strategies and Tactics for this entity and a business model that can bring most value for all. The working concept vehicle is operating and very exciting and very real!

We have also developed some compelling Business Chain Management offerings as although we are proven experts in all aspects of cradle to cradle (we borrowed that term from someone) Global demand/supply chain management, integrated logistics, operations and asset management practices we also know that its time for a next level of thought leadership thinking and actions to suit the world we are in and the one ahead of us. To many experts SC terminology for example has become a misused catch all and nothing phrase that has created and not integrated Company stovepipes/silos versus produced real “Business” Sales, Cost, and Profit and Innovation success results. Our Business Chain (Change) thinking, methods and actions help build a wave of change towards true “next generation” customer, people and talent centric collaborations and business innovations results successes.

Exciting – Outsourcers, the 3PL’s (4PL’s)

One of these next generation offerings is targeted at the current 3rd Party Logistics Outsource providers who have to keep up with the ever increasing demands and expectations of the Brand designers/ODM’s who outsource to others to get things produced and delivered for them to an ever increasing and demanding Customer and Cost reduction expectation. How do the 3PL’s survive and compete to thrive in this very demanding arena. Our offering, value enhancing propositions and know how to methods and “how to’s” are targeted to pragmatically help companies in this arena.

Exciting Times

So “lots going on” and it truly is an exciting time and opportunity for us all. Let the Sun shine and the gardens grow!

- Nigel

OK the Holidays and 2009 and decade reflections are done.
The Reclipse compass and talent is pointed in the help business while helping people make the complex simple directions and so far so good.
Reclipse will build on the foundations that we have secured in 2009 and help evangelize and support companies in building and transforming their businesses in the most profound and value oriented manner possible.
The social networking and community marketing focus is a blur of connection and real efficient navigation is needed so the “Fad Focus” moves to a more focused real value/ROI benefit instead of creating blurry “Blink” dots that are short lived and no-one can connect. I am not a twitter fan at this stage of its evolution as you might gather from my comments.
All being well it will be a year to continue the healing from the Economic Flu of the past few years. It will be a year and time of entities figuring out how to truly collaborate/partner to succeed and our umbrella lite methodology of Business Chain Management and Improvement will become a high value add for our clients and partners. We practice the Customer Driven – BC Sell, Recruit, Do methods and this year we will unveil more on these capabilities. Onward – Nigel

“The sexy new discussion in policy circles around the world, thanks to the recession, is whether a significant shift of power from men to women is underway — or whether it should be. Accounting giant Ernst & Young pulled out charts and graphs at a recent power lunch in Washington with female lawmakers to argue a provocative bottom line: Companies with more women in senior management roles make more money.”

This is from an article in the Washington Post (http://tinyurl.com/washpost) talking about a number of studies which have shown a direct connection between company profitability and increased senior management diversity at those companies. This is not going to be a surprise to the many women professionals who have spent their careers trying to break through the “glass ceiling” (the one that we’re told was shattered years ago – when? I must have missed it).

Large numbers of women keep leaving the corporate world to start their own businesses or join smaller entities where they have more control over their work and can lead a more balanced life (don’t say women aren’t risk takers). The current economic and social mess in this country has been caused by the greed and mis-management endemic to the masculine model of competition in business. Co-operation will get you alot further down the road to profitability and success, just look at the results from these studies – “Pepperdine found that the Fortune 500 firms with the best records of putting women at the top were 18 to 69 percent more profitable than the median companies in their industries.”

Susan Rosin
President, Reclipse Group

“It’s the end of the world as we know it,” and we at Reclipse feel fine because we get it, we are proven agents of change. Today, companies are holistic business chains and entities; Economics 101 and Demand and Supply Management fluency are still the key measures of success; and after living through the boom and breakage of the dot com era we know that the world and business, as we operate now in the 21st Century, has changed and times are tough again. We are in an age of Alternative Energies, On-Line Communities, Health and Design of Living changes – that to survive and thrive people and companies must change and adapt to the new economy and the new world ahead of us. Companies need to be proactive and positive not reactive and behind.

To us at Reclipse, the Supply Chain as we know it is gone and has morphed into a true Holistic “Business Chain” as we describe it. We cannot think or act like the old school, we need to help the old school adapt and the new school inherit the best DNA/Genetic code of business know-how possible. Trailblazing companies are well beyond Lean, Six Sigma, ERP, outsourcing just because, etc. We are in an era where business is complex enough, so lets simplify it and take a leaf or two out of the way an Apple thinks and acts to continually improve ease of use and build innovative and profound services and products (iTunes, iPhone and iLife for example). REI has high prices and sells high quality goods to the adventurer and explorer- a mountain bike, gear to climb a mountain or just a great pair of hiking boots. Thousands of SKU’s, great retail and on-line shopping environments, REI makes money and pleases customers and if you are not happy with it just return it.

Facebook, Twitter and Linkedin plus the Zoominfo worlds are with us and helping change the “face” of what we do and how we do it. Developing our “own space and and clients and growing into it. You truly need GPS and a Garmin to help you navigate the business terrain and be the new world class because it is indeed the end of the world as we knew it (and we do feel fine).

So what is the same and what is different. Some thoughts:

• Cost is still important but lowest total cost, best value and quickly, freaky fast as Toms ….the sandwich chain says and does. Not the cheapest but so fast and good.
• On-demand mass personalization delivered to your door or acquired in your store
• Community and holistic communities. I always liked the “portfolio” word and you always look to having a strong portfolio
• Invest in USA! Buy in USA! Homesourcing becomes the trend. Awaysourcing is secondary. What a waste of fuel and time when we can make the complex simple and Homesource!