What Good Looks Like

In my last blog post on alignment, I wrote about the power of Lean Daily Management and how I saw it help transform a 70-year-old company that was in a word, quite “hierarchical”. This month I want to share some thoughts on a different alignment topic, “what good looks like”.

In the business context getting people aligned around what outcomes really matter can be quite daunting. In fact, at one point in my career I saw a business score-carding platform have literally thousands of reports in it, the level at which you could analyze the business was overwhelming. It was at this time in my career that I learned the phrase; “analysis paralysis”. The essential definition of this being because there are so many data points you can often find yourself unable to make decisions as you look at all of the variables of the business you are leading and managing.

At Getting Thru we can guide you on how to avoid analysis paralysis in your business, especially as you work to implement change, measure success, and ensure ROI expectations are met. As experienced leaders and practitioners we can provide you the frameworks, especially in Program and Project Management space that you need to drive success.

Great Program and Project Management disciplines are crucial to success in a transformation journey. Commitment to these disciplines must be driven from the senior most leadership charged with modeling the behaviors that will bring the outcomes the business needs. Based on our experience and best practice senior leaders should work to see their business through an “integrated frame” from an outcome perspective, driving alignment around the three most critical outcomes an organization delivers, employee metrics, customer metrics and financial metrics.

The integrated frame is not a new concept, it’s been around for many years. It’s hard to argue against it. Essentially it demands you look at the performance of your company with the employee in mind FIRST, your customers SECOND and your Financial results THIRD. The idea here is to fight the inertia that is often found in companies, “as long as we are making money and meeting our financial plan, everything else is secondary”. How do you know if you are in an organization that lives and breathes life into its business with this frame? Well, here are a few things to consider.

1. Do you hear your employees often described as “your most important asset”?

2. Do you spend most of your time analyzing numbers and financial results instead of leading and managing your talent?

3. Do you measure employee engagement with the same level of important as customer engagement?

There are many more I can list here, moral of the story is the best of companies, those who are built to last are very clear, you might say aligned on what matters most within the integrated frame. As one of my favorite authors and speakers, Simon Sinek puts it and I and paraphrasing here, “money and profit is the fuel for a company, without it you can’t go anywhere”. I am in no way suggesting that we here at Getting Thru don’t believe in making money, we do and we have led in businesses that have done so with great success. If we are prioritizing, and we know the most successful companies in the world do this, you start with your employees, take the best of care of them, they in turn will care deeply for your customers and together they will create the profitable growth you are looking for.