In 1977, CSI met and began to work with the team that had designed the Procter and Gamble, inaptly named “Technician Teams” only a decade earlier, which were self-organizing with very limited hierarchical decision-making. They were a product of a revolutionary new way of thinking about work, as well as business, and were imbedded inside the newly re-envisioned Soap Business. “Technician” was a misnomer since the teams consisted of marketing, sales, research and manufacturing and connected by lines of business.

Results:

  • The cost of production was 10% of the rest of the industry which meant margins far exceeded any in the industry.
  • A market share of 72% was achieved within two years and was retained or exceeded for decades while it remained under the same managing team.
  • A customer satisfaction rate that was over 92% within one year and climbed every year there after, to 98% where it remained while the same team managed the business.
  • Stock valuations went up by double digits for over ten years, attributed in large part to this new business, and grew revenues by 30%-45% per year for over a decade and continues to retain high growth rates for the industry.
  • P&G remains a highly desirable employer and less than 1% of all applicants are hired annually.
  • Four of eleven board members are women.

For more details, see the prologue in my 2011 book, The Responsible Business: Reimagining Sustainability and Success.

Additionally, more depth will be found in my upcoming book, Reimagining Work and Business: Moving Management from Self-Actualizing to System Actualizing (2016)