Operations and constraints
Vicente Falconi: O que importa é resultado
The story of Brazil’s best-known management consultant, whose results-driven method shaped AmBev and the 3G Capital school of management.
Key concepts
- Management is about hitting goals; results are what matter
- Clear targets broken down through the organisation, with owners
- PDCA cycle and standardisation as the engine of continuous improvement
- Meritocracy and measurement as culture
How I use it
I read this on a training course soon after joining AB InBev in the Dominican Republic, where everyone was obsessed with PDCA. As an industrial engineer, it clicked straight away. It gave me the mental model I still use: what’s the KPI, what’s the target, how do you measure it, and can everyone see it all the time?
People think the method is the routine: the meeting, the presentation. It isn’t. It’s execution discipline, shared by your team and every other team. When there’s a KPI review every month, you spend the whole month trying to move the number.
Since leaving AB InBev I’ve brought it into every team I’ve run, Ocado included: an end-of-month recap of what happened, what we learned, the diagnosis, and what we’re aiming for next. Even without a KPI, it keeps me honest. Each month I can look back at the last one, see the trade-offs and how we got past them, and know whether we’re on course or need to correct it.
Connected books
Moneyball