CPOEP cheat sheet

PESTLE covers Political, Economic, Social, Technological, Legal and Environmental factors; these are external macro forces outside direct organizational control.

Porter's Five Forces: rivalry among existing competitors, supplier bargaining power, buyer bargaining power, threat of new entrants, threat of substitutes. Combined force intensity determines industry profit potential.

VRIO: a resource yields sustained competitive advantage only if it is Valuable, Rare, costly to Imitate and supported by Organization. Failing one criterion caps the outcome at parity, temporary advantage or unused potential.

SWOT is descriptive (internal Strengths/Weaknesses, external Opportunities/Threats); TOWS converts it into strategy by pairing S/W with O/T to produce SO, ST, WO and WT options.

Porter's generic strategies: cost leadership (broad market, low cost), differentiation (broad market, unique value), focus (narrow segment with cost or differentiation). Firms between them are 'stuck in the middle' and earn below-average returns.

Ansoff matrix (existing/new products × existing/new markets) yields market penetration, product development, market development and diversification; risk rises in roughly that order, with diversification highest.

Corporate governance: shareholders elect the board, the board appoints the CEO and oversees strategy, risk and financial reporting. Separation of ownership and control creates agency costs, mitigated by independent directors, audit committees and equity-linked incentives.

Triple bottom line reports economic, social and environmental performance; ESG disclosure extends this into investor-grade, comparable reporting.

Strategy cascade: mission (why the organization exists) → vision (future state) → values → goals → measurable objectives → initiatives → KPIs.

Hersey-Blanchard situational leadership matches style to follower readiness: directing (S1), coaching (S2), supporting (S3), delegating (S4).

Full-range leadership model ranks laissez-faire as least effective, transactional as mid-range (contingent reward, management by exception) and transformational as most effective for discretionary effort.

Transformational leadership rests on the four I's: idealized influence, inspirational motivation, intellectual stimulation, individualized consideration.

Ethical decision tests: utilitarian (greatest net welfare), rights and duties (respect entitlements), justice (fair distribution of burdens and benefits), virtue (what a person of good character would do), common good.

Kohlberg's stages: pre-conventional (punishment avoidance, self-interest), conventional (interpersonal conformity, law and order), post-conventional (social contract, universal principles).

Schein's culture layers: artifacts (visible), espoused beliefs and values (stated), basic underlying assumptions (unconscious and behaviour-driving). Changing assumptions is the hardest and most durable lever.

Competing Values Framework quadrants: clan (collaborate, internal/flexible), adhocracy (create, external/flexible), market (compete, external/stable), hierarchy (control, internal/stable).

Tone at the top, a written code of conduct, conflict-of-interest disclosure and training are preventive ethics controls; hotlines, audits and investigations are detective controls.

Psychological safety (Edmondson) is the shared belief that interpersonal risk-taking is safe; it predicts error reporting, learning behaviour and speak-up rates.

Stakeholder salience = power + legitimacy + urgency. All three present = definitive stakeholder; two = expectant; one = latent.

Power/interest grid actions: high power/high interest = manage closely; high power/low interest = keep satisfied; low power/high interest = keep informed; low/low = monitor.

Kano categories: must-be (dissatisfiers), performance (linear), attractive (delighters), indifferent, reverse. Attractive attributes migrate to must-be over time as expectations rise.

SERVQUAL five dimensions: tangibles, reliability, responsiveness, assurance, empathy. Reliability is consistently the highest-weighted dimension in customer ratings.

Net Promoter Score = % promoters (9-10) − % detractors (0-6); passives (7-8) are excluded; the scale runs from −100 to +100.

CSAT = satisfied responses ÷ total responses × 100. Customer Effort Score measures perceived effort to resolve an issue and predicts loyalty better than satisfaction in service transactions.

Customer lifetime value ≈ (average order value × purchases per year × retention years) − acquisition cost; the retention form is margin × retention rate ÷ (1 + discount rate − retention rate).

Voice of customer sources: interviews, focus groups, surveys, complaint and warranty data, social listening, win/loss analysis, advisory panels.

Churn rate = customers lost in period ÷ customers at start of period × 100; retention rate = 1 − churn rate.

DMAIC: Define (charter, VOC, CTQs), Measure (baseline, MSA), Analyze (root cause, hypothesis tests), Improve (pilot, FMEA), Control (SPC, standard work, mistake-proofing). DMADV/DFSS applies to designing new processes.

Eight wastes (TIMWOODS): Transport, Inventory, Motion, Waiting, Overproduction, Overprocessing, Defects, unused Skills. Overproduction is often called the worst waste because it generates the others.

Takt time = available production time ÷ customer demand rate; it sets the required pace of output, not the process's measured capability.

Little's Law: WIP = throughput rate × cycle (flow) time. At fixed throughput, cutting WIP proportionally cuts lead time.

Value stream mapping separates value-added, necessary non-value-added and pure non-value-added steps; process cycle efficiency = value-added time ÷ total lead time.

Theory of constraints five focusing steps: identify the constraint, exploit it, subordinate everything else to it, elevate it, then repeat - guarding against inertia becoming the new constraint.

5S: sort, set in order, shine, standardize, sustain; sustain is the step most often lost and the determinant of durability.

Six Sigma target is 3.4 defects per million opportunities long term; DPMO = defects ÷ (units × opportunities) × 1,000,000.

PDCA (Shewhart/Deming): plan, do, check, act. SDCA (standardize, do, check, act) locks in gains before the next improvement cycle.

Balanced Scorecard perspectives: financial, customer, internal process, learning and growth. Each carries objectives, measures, targets and initiatives connected by a cause-and-effect strategy map.

SMART objectives: specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, time-bound.

Leading indicators predict future results (training hours, preventive maintenance completed, near-miss reporting); lagging indicators confirm results already achieved (revenue, injury rate, defect rate).

OEE = availability × performance × quality; approximately 85% is the commonly cited world-class benchmark.

Cp = (USL − LSL) ÷ 6σ measures potential capability; Cpk = min[(USL − μ), (μ − LSL)] ÷ 3σ penalizes off-centre processes. Cpk ≤ Cp always.

SPC control limits are set at ±3σ around the process mean and are not specification limits. Only special-cause signals justify intervention; over-adjusting common-cause variation increases variation (tampering).

MSA/Gage R&R: repeatability (equipment variation) plus reproducibility (appraiser variation); under 10% of tolerance is ideal, over 30% is generally unacceptable.

Measurement scales: nominal (labels), ordinal (rank only), interval (equal spacing, arbitrary zero), ratio (true zero, supports multiplication and division).

Pareto principle: roughly 80% of effects come from 20% of causes - used to prioritize improvement and defect-reduction effort.

Correlation does not establish causation; R² in regression reports the proportion of variance in the dependent variable explained by the model.

ADDIE: Analysis, Design, Development, Implementation, Evaluation; the cycle is iterative, with evaluation feeding the next analysis.

Kirkpatrick levels: 1 reaction, 2 learning, 3 behaviour, 4 results; Phillips adds level 5, ROI = (benefit − cost) ÷ cost × 100.

70-20-10: roughly 70% of capability comes from challenging job experience, 20% from coaching, mentoring and social learning, 10% from formal courses.

Competency gap = required proficiency − current proficiency; gaps are prioritized by criticality to strategy and by population size affected.

Nine-box grid plots performance against potential in a 3×3 matrix, driving development, promotion and succession decisions; high performance with low potential signals a specialist, not a promotion case.

Capability sourcing options are build (develop), buy (hire), borrow (contract or partner) and bot (automate); choice depends on scarcity, speed and strategic criticality.

Coaching is non-directive, question-led and aimed at the coachee's own solutions; mentoring transmits experience, advice and sponsorship and is typically more directive.

Turnover rate = separations ÷ average headcount × 100; distinguish voluntary, involuntary and regretted turnover, since each implies a different response.

Bloom's revised taxonomy (low to high): remember, understand, apply, analyse, evaluate, create - used to write measurable learning objectives.

Risk = likelihood × consequence. Risk appetite is the amount of risk willingly pursued; risk tolerance is the acceptable variation around it; risk capacity is the maximum absorbable loss.

Treatment options for threats: avoid, reduce (controls), transfer (insurance, contracts, outsourcing) and accept; for opportunities: exploit, enhance, share and accept.

Three lines model: first line (operational management) owns and manages risk; second line (risk, compliance, quality) provides expertise, frameworks and monitoring; third line (internal audit) gives independent assurance to the board. External audit sits outside the model.

COSO internal control components: control environment, risk assessment, control activities, information and communication, monitoring activities.

ISO 9001 seven principles: customer focus, leadership, engagement of people, process approach, improvement, evidence-based decision making, relationship management - all management-system clauses trace back to these.

Corrective action eliminates the cause of a detected nonconformity; preventive action addresses potential nonconformity; containment (correction) protects the customer immediately and is not a root-cause fix.

Cost of quality: prevention + appraisal are conformance costs; internal + external failure are non-conformance costs. Failure cost typically escalates about tenfold at each stage a defect moves downstream.

Root-cause tools: 5 Whys, Ishikawa fishbone using 6M (man, machine, material, method, measurement, environment), FMEA with RPN = severity × occurrence × detection.

Compliance program elements: standards and procedures, senior oversight, training, monitoring and auditing, consistent discipline, and response plus remediation.

Kotter's eight steps: create urgency, build a guiding coalition, form a strategic vision, communicate it, remove barriers and empower action, generate short-term wins, consolidate gains, anchor changes in culture.

Lewin's model: unfreeze (build readiness, loosen old norms), move/change (implement), refreeze (institutionalize as the new standard).

ADKAR: Awareness, Desire, Knowledge, Ability, Reinforcement. It describes individual change; the first element not yet satisfied is the blocking point, and communication alone only addresses awareness and desire.

Bridges' transition: ending and letting go, the neutral zone, then a new beginning. It is the psychological response to change and runs on a different timeline from the external project.

Resistance is categorized as rational (self-interest, workload, competence), emotional (fear, loss, trust) or political (power and resource shifts); each requires a different intervention.

Sponsor commitment - active, visible and resourced at the right level - is consistently the strongest single predictor of change success; a coalition beats a lone champion.

Continuous improvement toolkit: PDCA, kaizen events, suggestion systems, hoshin kanri for strategy deployment, A3 for structured problem solving and narrative alignment.

Communication planning specifies audience, key message, channel, frequency, sender and feedback loop; core messages need repeated delivery through multiple channels to be heard.

Change saturation: portfolio capacity is finite, so concurrent initiatives must be sequenced and paced against absorptive capacity or delivery erodes on all of them.