Tony Kunowski M.com (Hons), B.Sc
Tony's career
has centred on the leadership and management of change and his primary
skills are in the facilitation of strategic and business planning and
the development and implementation of communication and leadership
strategies to help key stakeholder groups achieve their goals (see his approach to strategic management).
After gaining a BSc in Pure and Applied Mathematics and a M.Com
(Hons) in Economics, specialising in Econometrics and Operations
Research, Tony Kunowski began his career in 1969 at Mobil Oil (NZ)
Ltd and as Advisory Officer in the Department of Trade and
Industry.
He became involved in the academic world as a tutor in
Economics and Statistics at the Christchurch Polytechnic. As Head of
Department in 1979, he introduced a multi-disciplinary, modular Diploma
of Business Studies.
The challenge of a private sector
career resulted in a move to United Building Society where he became
Manager of Public Relations, and in 1988 General Manager of Corporate
Affairs. Tony's principal responsibilities from the outset were
strategic planning and public relations. A significant part of
the communications effort was to assist the change process and to
reorient management and staff towards the longer-term strategic
objectives of the United Group. He was acclaimed for his
management of $170 million "run on funds" ( United Building Society,
1988). He was the leader of the world's first
environmentally-focused political party (NZ Values Party, 1976-1979).
After
this, Tony was the General Manager of the Christchurch Symphony
Orchestra from 1991 to 2002. During that time he transformed a part
time orchestra to a fully professional orchestra with an international
make up. The CSO challenge was a major exercise in orchestrating a
major shift in culture.
Since 2003 Tony has worked on a part time basis as Executive Director of the CPIT Foundation Trust and in 2008 he was contracted to the University of Canterbury as Assistant Director in UC Education Plus within the College of Education.
Tony has carried out a number of
strategic planning projects for Lukey Resources / SmartNet with
clients as diverse as Victory Park Board (Jade Stadium- now AMI
Stadium), National Radiation Laboratory, L&M Mining, Brown Bros
Engineers Ltd. and Cholmondeley Children's Home. He is available
for strategic planning, change management and executive coaching
assignments.
Strategic
management has supplanted strategic planning to ensure the optimisation
of both short term and long term profitability. It consists of
strategic posture management, ie determining which markets to be in and
what "position" to adopt in each of these markets, and real time issue
management to deal with the surprise element, some seen from afar,
others undetected until they are an immediate and major threat to the
organisation. Although conventional strategic planning underpins the
strategic management process, it has limited applicability when the
organisation's external environment is changing rapidly. In such cases
for example, historical strengths may become current weaknesses.
Tony
Kunowski uses a powerful analytical tool developed by the "father of
strategic management" Igor Ansoff. Validated in over 1000 case studies
in different industries and different countries, the tool seeks to
align an organisation's strategic aggressiveness with the level of
expected environmental turbulence and to match the internal management
capabilities to support this level of aggressiveness. A series of easy
to use templates provide the basis for the analysis.
At
higher levels of environmental turbulence management systems MUST
become creative to ensure optimal performance under conditions of great
uncertainty. Organisations that have embraced the ethos of innovation
and creativity are the stellar performers in such environments. These
organisations will have formulated an innovation strategy to support
their level of strategic aggressiveness, and a strong innovation
culture will have developed enshrining "systemic innovation" as a
fundamental norm. Regular assessment of their innovation capabilities
would have identified gaps between actual and desired performance level
in all 7 areas of systemic innovation - strategy, business,
organisation, product, process, technology and marketing.
Tony
presents an integrated package covering the innovation management
process which includes a capability
assessment and the provision of relevant innovation tools to enable the
organisation to improve its innovation performance in the identified
areas of weakness.
Contact us about Tony Kunowski