Join Base Camp | Login |
Currently viewing the category:
"EOS"
No body talks about the elephant in the room. It’s too uncomfortable. The boss goes ballistic if you mention that subject to her.
Its too embarrassing. If I bring that subject up, then everyone will know about it.
An EOS colleague and friend of mine, Rip Tilden, remembers his mother reminding him,- “People know”. He calls it his mother’s greatest leadership lesson. It’s true in your family and its true in your neighborhood.
It’s also true in your business. Let’s face it. There are very few secrets in most small companies. Everybody already knows about it.
If it’s that employee that you can’t bring yourself to terminate for poor performance, everyone knows about him already. They are probably upset with you for not doing anything about him and expecting them to work harder to compensate for him.
If it’s that personal friend of yours, or your family’s, you haven’t been able to talk with about the significant money that is owed your company, everybody knows. Everyday that this continues, you lose respect in their eyes. That person is not your friend if you can’t discuss this issue directly with him.
What elephant is in your room? What aren’t you dealing with? Resolve to do so now. You are hurting, not helping, your company more every day that you wait. If you want a great resource, read Fierce Conversations by Susan Scott. If you want to talk about it, let me know. Good luck.
When I use the word “commitment,” many interpret it as commitment to the company, team, or cause. That’s not at all what I’m referring to here. Of course everyone on your leadership team is committed to the company (I hope). The question is, is each person on your leadership team committed to every decision you make every time?
Do You Have 100% Commitment When Resolving an Issue Every Time?
Another way of saying 100% commitment is “buy-in,” “on the same page,” or “agreement.” Without 100% commitment on every conclusion, you’ll have the same issues come up over and over. You will end up with side conversations that are unhealthy and lack crispness, which takes more effort to achieve results. You simply won’t have a united front on your leadership team.
One simple step to achieve 100% commitment and to make sure that every member on your leadership team buys in is to simply ask. At the end of IDS (click here to see the issues solving track), ask each member of the leadership team if they are all committed to the decision. The reason you might not ask most of the time is that you’re afraid to ask or you’re trying to rush to get through the agenda. It’s vital that you do it every time.
Not all members are going to agree or they might have gone a different way if it were their decision, but if they’ve been heard and they can genuinely live with it, support it, embrace it, and help drive it, then you truly have commitment.
“A man ordinarily has time to do all the things he really wants to do.” Anonymous
Have you ever said to yourself “if only I had the time, I would do _______. “ If – fill in the blank – is something you really want to do, why aren’t you doing it now? Is the issue really a lack of time? Or is the issue that you really don’t want to do it and “lack of time” is a convenient excuse? After all, everyone uses the “I don’t have time” excuse, so we’ve grown accustomed to using it ourselves.
Each of us faces choices every day. When we choose to do what we really want to do, we’re not kidding ourselves. Choice is a variable. The “want to do” can be an act of kindness or an act of selfishness. Either way, we’re making a choice. We’re taking control and driving the bus.
Time, on the other hand is a constant. Our lifespan may be a little longer or shorter than others on the planet but each day we have 24 hours, no more, no less. Our lives are finite. So, we can’t save time, lose time, make time, buy a little more time or go back in time. And, time spends itself, so we can only choose what to do or not do with the 24 hours that we have each day. So, when we think that we have no choice and that time dictates the things we must do, we’re putting ourselves under the bus.
Think of time as a resource, not a limiter. Choose wisely. Use the resource and believe that you are doing things because you choose to do them.
When you face some issues with your team, emotions may flare and that can become a hindrance to resolving the issues. Take a moment to view this video for some tips on how to guide your team through the emotions to a positive conclusion.
Every entrepreneurial company, regardless of size, never has enough people, money and time to accomplish all the goals its leaders can envision for it. Its the nature of the beast.
Given that resources are always deficient in someway, its imperative to remember that perfect is the enemy of done. EOS advocates the 20/80 rule. Focus on accomplishing the 20% of the task at hand that will get you 80% of the result.
Leaders who try for perfect tend to keep refining, touching up, worrying that they missed something, testing, retesting, and then testing again.
For example, if you don’t have a documented customer service process in place that represents what for you are your best practices for achieving customer delight you are faced with a choice.
You can spend the next couple of months (quarters, year?) researching other people’s best practices in your industry, deciding which of those to adopt, then writing them up in excruciating detail, proofing them, running them in trials, analyzing the results, re-doing some prior steps, running more trials perhaps, and finally implementing them.
Or you could create them very simply, in a 20/80 rule way, by documenting the major steps in the process at a very high level, with several bullets under each step, which are the procedures. Then insist that everyone follow them. Finally, modify them, if and when necessary.
Which do you do in your company?
If you apply this idea to the six to ten core processes in your business, you will have documented your company’s WAY of doing business, as Michael Gerber of E-Myth fame would say, its your franchise model.
FYI: the six to ten core processes typically include: HR, Marketing, Sales, several Operations (the way you deliver your product or service) processes, Accounting, and Customer Service. Hint: If you decide to do this, the first, and key, step is for your leadership team to decide what your core processes are. Agree on them first and then have each functional leader write up the core processes for which they are responsible.
It feels like an oxymoron discussing process to entrepreneurial leaders, but I hope to make clear the value of marrying process and entrepreneurship.
Jim Collins’s words say it best: “Magic occurs when you combine the spirit of entrepreneurialism with a culture of discipline.” Or in another common phrase, “You must systemize the predictable so you can humanize the exceptional.”
Is everyone following your company’s core processes? What processes, you might ask? Your company has a “way,” and you and your people might be taking it for granted. If you packaged it, it would actually be worth something. The way you market, the way you sell, the way you deliver, the way you retain your customers is unique and valuable. Often many discount it because it comes so naturally.
The reality, in most cases, is that you and your people are just not doing it consistently or that you’ve gotten away from it. Imagine if everyone did it the exact same way—your “way”—every day. How much more revenue, how much more efficiency, and how much more peace of mind could be achieved?
What are your company’s core processes? Are they documented? Is everyone following them consistently?
Shiny stuff is akin to the “sirens song” of Homer’s Odyssey, a promising beginning that ends with a bad result. Just as the sirens of mythology lured sailors to their deaths, “shiny stuff” could potentially sink your boat.
If you’re like many business owners, you have lots of ideas and boundless energy. You’re excited by the next big idea or golden opportunity. In your mind, these ideas and opportunities start out as a solid “10”, on a scale of 1 – 10, where “ten” is a no-brainer. But, before you dive in, take this little test and ask yourself:
- Does it perpetuate our vision?
- Does it embrace our purpose, passion or cause?
- If we pursue it, can we be the best at doing it?
- Have we optimized our core business?
- Do we have the resources?
How did you do? Odds may be that it’s no longer a “no-brainer”.
By all means, explore. But, protect the core. The boat sails best when the water is on the outside, the sailors are on the inside and the shiny stuff is reflecting off the compass.
A friend of mine who ministers to very poor communities in Mexico recently wrote, “Passion without organization produces frivolous fluff but organization without passion leads to lifeless and purposeless tedium.”
This is the time of year many of us pause to plan our future. Will we plan to produce “frivolous fluff”, “purposeless tedium” or something of real and perhaps enduring value?
At times, a clarified vision amounts to “lifeless” words on a page – more stuff to do without much purpose or excitement behind the things to be done. That’s tedium.
Entrepreneurial organizations are one of the few, if not only, places where teams and individuals can choose their path. We get to craft our own futures, taking on causes larger than ourselves. We get to plan in structure and processes to achieve what we want. So, when we have all finished drafting our 3-Year Pictures and 1-Year Plans, we need to challenge ourselves. Have we planned for “lifeless and purposeless tedium” or for something really meaningful we can get excited about and sink our teeth into? If we’re not excited about the path we’ve selected, we need to pick a different one.
All EOS companies use a two page document called the Vision/Traction Organizer (V/TO) to take a simple, effective approach to strategic planning. By answering the eight questions on the V/TO, they capture what hopefully was in their heads to begin with and make it available for all employees to see – who they are, what they are, where they are going, and how they are going to get there.
The fifth section on the V/TO is titled the 3-Year Picture. This is where the leadership of the company has a chance to express in vivid terms where the company is going to be in 3-years. Your finance team might relate to EBITDA and margin, but beyond perhaps your top line revenue, most employees have a difficult time seeing in their mind’s eye what the company will look like in the future and, importantly, how and where they will fit in. Is there any opportunity to build a career here or not?
That is why we ask EOS executives to describe in five to fifteen simple phrases what the company will look like in just three short years. How many offices will it have? How many employees? Will there be new products or services? How many customers might it have? You get the idea.
If everyone can see the future state of the company and relate to it, you will get there faster and your best people will still be with you.
If the simplicity of the V/TO appeals to you, you can download a copy here.
One of the most well-received articles I ever wrote was called “All You Need Is One Great People-Move This Quarter”
Recently, I recorded a video on the subject and thought you’d enjoy a nudge and receiving it in a different medium.
Enjoy!
