Creating a stellar organization involves setting the
conditions to help people do their very best work. You
could say that your team's or your company's success
depends on designing the circumstances under which people
can function most effectively. The better you set the
conditions, the more profitable your business will be!
Two areas that deserve attention in this regard are
1) your ability to observe the results of interactions and
relationships in your organization, and
2) how well your business can shift to becoming
system-dependent instead of remaining person-dependent.
Each aspect plays a critical role in ensuring the long-term
success of your team, department, or enterprise.
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Are You Carefully Observing Cause and Effect?
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Your business success requires you to observe and fine-tune
a series of cause-and-effect relationships within your
organization. To accomplish this goal, however, you'll need
to be on the lookout for clues that indicate that something
may be amiss.
That's because no matter how well you think you may have
set the conditions for success, you won't know for sure if
they're set correctly until you carefully monitor how they
are shaping or influencing what people are doing, saying,
and feeling.
The conditions can be very obvious ones -- such as those
established via company policies to guide personnel
development. On the other hand, many cause-and-effect
relationships aren't very obvious. In some situations,
you'll need a keen sense of awareness to detect their
effects.
When the conditions aren't ideal, you'll see certain
symptoms, such as people stumbling over obstacles and
frequently hearing confusing or unclear messages from
management. If you remain blissfully unaware of these areas
of confusion, they can dissolve the morale and the bottom
line of your organization like corrosive acid. If that
happens, people can't do their best, and the organization,
business, company, operation, or team won't achieve its
goals.
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Are You System-Dependent?
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Great results generally arise from well thought-out systems
and procedures that give personnel a consistent and
coherent structure to work with, yet also provide people
with the latitude to "wow" customers as needed.
Perhaps you have at least a few stellar performers in your
organization who don't cease to amaze your management,
colleagues, and customers. (Or, maybe that performer is
you, wearing every hat in your solo enterprise!)
It's great to have such competent and talented people on
board, but what exactly drives their success? Is it their
own unique way of doing things that almost no one can
imitate? Or is it expertise and knowledge built around a
repeatable formula laid out in your systems and procedures?
The difference can mean the long-term success or failure of
your business. Why is that?
It's easy to guess. Let's say Ms. Star Performer or Mr.
Know-It-All gets a better offer down the street, has a bad
illness, or goes on an extended vacation. Suddenly that
font of wisdom on whom everyone depended disappears at the
drop of a hat. Who can competently fill in or take over? If
there are no systems or procedures in place to explain how
the work gets done, it may be a moot point.
Similarly, when employees have to guess everything as they
go along, inventing their hand-offs to other people and
groups, it shows a lack of system dependence. In good cases
or in bad, being person-dependent rather than
system-dependent can vastly limit your company's potential
to succeed.
In conclusion, by monitoring cause-and-effect in your
organization, and also depending on systems and procedures
more than individual star performers, you'll lay a
foundation for a sustainable operation that can produce
satisfying, long-term results.
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Adele Sommers, Ph.D. is the author of the award-winning
"Straight Talk on Boosting Business Performance" program.
She helps people "discover and recover" the profits their
businesses may be losing every day through overlooked
performance potential. To sign up for more free tips, visit
her site at http://LearnShareProsper.com
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