John Tisdale is an innovative problem solver for organizations who are not maximizing their potential for growth. He started his first company in Bolivar, Missouri in 1983 while in college studying computer science. He began developing software for businesses on some of the first personal computers to hit the market.
He developed expertise in applying technology to solve complex business needs. In the years that followed, it became increasingly clear that technology could go only so far in helping organizations adapt to the changing needs of business. Even the best technologies couldn’t help dysfunctional organizations succeed.
Most businesses that engaged John did so to help them solve their lowest-level problems, such as managing data and information. The perception was that if they improved these low-level systems, they could better adapt, grow and succeed. Over time, John discovered that solving problems from the bottom upward just didn’t affect enough positive change. That is, better technology simply allowed people to continue using bad business practices and tactics to slightly increase productivity.
It became clear to John that most of the problems that inhibited organizational growth flowed from the top down. If you have good data management systems in place but use ineffective tactics or strategies, your growth potential will be significantly capped. John came to realize that business success started at the top of the organization (its leadership) and flowed downward through its vision, its strategies, its tactics, and finally to its logistical systems. Alignment had to start at the top and flow downward. Otherwise, the chaos that flowed downward couldn’t be overcome with better low-level systems.
So, John began expanding his expertise beyond simply developing software applications. He became a student of business processes. He learned how to assess, streamline and model effective business processes. Then, before John designed technology systems to manage dysfunctional business processes, he first solved their business processes and then built good data management systems on top of them.
Yet, it was clear this didn’t go far enough. Most of the organizations that engaged John weren’t even measuring and reporting their key performance indicators (KPI’s). Their data wasn’t intelligent enough to feed its leadership the right information to help them make better business decisions. As such, John became a student of business intelligence systems. He learned to look for patterns in their business performance that indicated what they were doing right and what needed to be changed. This allowed John to begin building effective business intelligence systems that measured and reported the most valuable information.
In the years that followed, John continued to broaden his skill-set to include business strategies, change management, personality profiling and team management, enterprise systems architecture, taxonomy and information architecture, SQL and relational database modeling and development, requirements gatherings, needs assessments, user experience design, and audience segmentation strategies (topographic, demographic, psychographic and behavioral).
Technology is a powerful vehicle for change. The right technology in the right hands can allow an organization to quickly adapt to changing market demands. Yet, both staff-facing information technologies as well as public-facing social technologies must be part of a comprehensive plan to manage changes in where an organization is headed and how they will get there. This involves a multi-tiered, multi-year approach that will likely impact every layer of the organization’s business processes and strategies.
John started Tandem Partners in 2001 for the purpose of helping organizations achieve better success by aligning their leadership, vision, strategies, tactics and technologies. He typically works with mid-sized organizations ($25-250 million) whose growth curve has reached a plateau. If this describes your organization, John brings 3 decades of experience at helping kick-starting organizations like yours back onto a healthy growth curve.