Couverture de Decisions at the Fulcrum

Decisions at the Fulcrum

Decisions at the Fulcrum

De : William Hoffman Ph.D.
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Decisions at the Fulcrum is a show where pivotal moments of crisis are covered with depth and breadth, to explain why the communication that transpires within organizations and groups is central to the process and outcomes of organizational change and tenacity. Each episode unpacks a turning point—a brand pivot, a bold leadership move, a course correction. The show explores pivotal decision moments. Through layered storytelling and applied research moments, Dr. William Hoffman navigates through coy tensions and catalytic decisions that reshape brands, industries, institutions, and the persons involved. This podcast is made for the entrepreneurial mind, the reflective leader, the culturally competent executive, the start up scholar, and anyone who knows that the fulcrum is where it all turns. Come for insight, come for stories, come for forays into the academic forests, where meaning rustles just past the clearing!

URL: https://DATfulcrum.podbean.com

Copyright 2025 All rights reserved. Economie Science Sciences sociales
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    Épisodes
    • Desserts With(out) Vigilance: How “Just a Small Spill” Became a Crisis.

      Desserts With(out) Vigilance: How “Just a Small Spill” Became a Crisis.
      Feb 13 2026
      Ice cream has a knack for comfort, trust, and pleasant moments. Yet, as you step into an ice cream establishment, the atmosphere shifts to metallic sounds, machine hums, moisture gathers on the chilled pipes, and water droplets sliding down the edges. This episode of Decisions at the Fulcrum explores the account of the 2015–2016 Blue Bell listeria outbreak, considering it as an enduring reminder of the significance of food safety and an in-depth case related to decision-making and communication. In terms of the latter, this case sheds light on what is taken into account inside organizations, what is neglected, and how legitimate questions as well as concerns fade into “background noise” up to the moment they result in catastrophe. Utilizing Vigilant Interaction Theory (VIT), the episode explores four structured inquiries: problem definition, goals, alternatives, and tradeoffs. Addressing each shows how the comforting notion of “procedural tidiness” (quick closure, deferred acknowledgement of risk, frictionless consensus) can turn into an ineffective operating environment over time. Instead, VIT might suggest a different framework for avoiding a crisis situation like the one at Blue Bell. That involves consistent checkpoints, safeguards for dissent, and pathways for escalation of reporting concerns, ensuring that fast and frictionless consensus is not given priority.
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      31 min
    • Upstream Decisions, Downstream Composure: Mercadona’s Total Quality as Grocery Infrastructure

      Upstream Decisions, Downstream Composure: Mercadona’s Total Quality as Grocery Infrastructure
      Feb 2 2026
      What does a grocery retail chain look like when supply chain management is the infrastructure? In this episode of Decisions at the Fulcrum, we go to Valencia, Spain!🇪🇸 When we look closely at Mercadona, we'll see restraint with reliability as a mature way to coordinate. Mercadona rebuilt grocery retail in Spain around routine, comprehension, and learning by considering supply chain design as infrastructure. I talk about how the company's use of Calidad Total (Total Quality Management) from 1993 to today changed the way they operated with suppliers, warehouses, associates, and consumers. I look at TQM as a frame for decisions like SKU reduction and routine pricing signals that are in fact intelligent and enduring. This episode looks at legibility by Scott (the capacity of an organization to read itself) and temporal depth (advancing by staying deeply grounded) using ideas from political anthropology and infrastructure studies. One important question this case poses though:
What if the best way to be responsible isn't to respond quickly, but to create a space where fewer responses are needed in the first place?
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      22 min
    • Shelf Stable Competence: Vega's perseverance in a category that keeps overpromising

      Shelf Stable Competence: Vega's perseverance in a category that keeps overpromising
      Jan 23 2026

      There was a time when a protein powder didn't pretend to be a personality type, thanks to history doing its irritating job. Inside a compostable wrapping, it offered no intensity, calmness, or equitable harmony. It was only a coarse, chalk-like implement for those who viewed eating as an administrative task.

      So how did we get from a few bars in the latter part of the 1980s and early 1990s to today's chaotic, unending protein aisle?

      We follow the sector's development via geography in this episode of Decisions at the Fulcrum, concentrating on the manufacturers, ideas, and commercial activities that made protein an adaptable point of view. Vega, our mentor guide today, started out in 2001 in Vancouver, British Columbia, where protein was presented as reliability, credibility, and responsibilities without the shouting.

      In an industry that is prone on spurious approaches, I trace Vega's exceptionally patient rise (independent for over a decade), WhiteWave's 2015 acquisition of the company, and WhiteWave's 2017 acquisition by Danone, in an exceptionally "responsive" sequence. Along the way, I consider what it really means when eating becomes designation rather than sustenance and why, frequently, competency seems to transcend all of the hype. Although these protein bars are no longer available, they certainly created space for the plethora of plant based varieties in the protein bar aisle today and they continue to offer several protein powders, often with additional nutritional claims attached to them.

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      21 min
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