P.O.C.
Management Services
Transforming Managers into Leaders
POC Management Services is a management consulting firm helping organizations across all industries employ the essential concepts of management - planning, organizing, and commitment - to improve individual, operational, and organizational performance. We have access to the latest research and emerging thinking on business, marketing, management, and leadership.
We do more than consult and advise, however. We bridge the gap between theory and practical application by taking managerial concepts out of the training room and into your office with a hands-on approach that focuses on results. Beyond training, we work side-by-side, on location, with our clients to help them diagnose short and long term problems, find solutions, implement new strategies, and see results.
Let us tell you a little bit more about who we are by telling you who we are not ...
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Have you ever heard the story about ...
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The Cowboy
A cowboy was watching his herd graze in a remote pasture when suddenly a brand-new BMW advanced out of a dust cloud towards him. The driver, a young man in a fancy suit, Gucci shoes, and Ray Ban sunglasses, leans out the window and asks the cowboy, "If I tell you exactly how many cows and calves you have in your herd, will you give me a calf?"
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The cowboy looks at the man, who was obviously impressed with himself, then looks at his peacefully grazing herd and calmly answers, "Sure. Why not?"
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The man parks his car, whips out his laptop, connects it to his Wi-Fi hotspot, and surfs to a page on the NASA web site where he calls up a GPS satellite navigation system to get an exact fix on this location. He feeds this information to another NASA satellite that scans the area into an ultra-high-resolution photo. The young man then opens the digital photo in Adobe Photoshop and exports it to an image processing facility in Hamburg, Germany. Within seconds, he receives an email on his iPhone X that the image has been processed and the data stored. He then accesses a macro enabled spreadsheet with pivot tables and hundreds of complex formulas. He uploads all of this data via an email on his iPhone and, after a few minutes, receives a response. Finally, he prints out a full-color 150 page report on his hi-tech, miniaturized HP LaserJet printer and at last turns to the cowboy and says, "You have exactly 1,586 cows and calves."
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"That's right. Well, I guess you can take one of my calves," says the cowboy.
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He watches the young man select one of the animals and looks on amused as the young man stuffs it into the trunk of his car. Then the cowboy says to the young man, "Hey, if I can tell you exactly what your business is, will you give me back my calf?" The young man thinks about it for a second and then says, "Okay, why not?" You're a consultant." says the cowboy.
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"Wow! That's correct," says the consultant, "but how did you guess that?"
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"No guessing required." answered the cowboy. "You showed up here even though nobody called you; you want to get paid for an answer I already knew to a question I never asked; and you don't know anything about my business.
Now, give me back my dog!"
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While this is an amusing anecdote whose origin we are unsure of, it does a great job of describing who we are not!
Darrin Finley
Darrin Finley founded P.O.C. Management Services in 2004 based on his passion for teaching the principles of management and leadership. Fueling this passion was his belief that management and leadership excellence are essential for organizational success across all industries. Darrin recognized early in his professional career that the disciplines of management/leadership were often viewed as esoteric “soft-skills” that were more art than science and thus couldn’t be taught – the old standby that “good managers/leaders were born not made”. Instead, Darrin believed that it was a focus on leadership development – more so than the “nuts and bolts” – that distinguished high performing organizations from the also rans.
Guided by the principles of management and leadership greats such as Peter Drucker, W. Edwards Deming, and Stephen Covey, Darrin developed the foundation of the services offered by P.O.C.; consultation and training on topics such as strategic planning, marketing planning, organizational development and design, operations improvement, supervisory skills, performance management, personal productivity, customer service, and diversity.
Darrin began his professional career in the financial services industry as a management trainee and rose to senior executive management in a wide variety of industries ranging from banking to hospitality with both privately held and publicly traded companies. He has been recognized for both his leadership and expertise in operations improvement and organizational development. An accomplished financial manager, Darrin has managed multi-million-dollar budgets, provided leadership for relatively large administrative production staffs numbering in the hundreds, and played key roles in developing long-term strategies to improve efficiency and increase revenue.
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A native of Birmingham, Alabama, Darrin was raised in Atlanta, Georgia. He currently lives in Jacksonville, Florida where he has served as a board member for organizations such as Learn to Read, The Jacksonville Public Library Foundation, and We Care Jacksonville. Additionally, he is a volunteer coach for I-9 and Jacksonville First Coast Soccer Association.
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Darrin received his Bachelor of Science degree in Industrial Management from the Georgia Institute of Technology and his Master of Business Administration from Jacksonville University. He also completed the advanced management program for executive development at Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business.