Over the years, I’ve worked with hundreds of business owners as a Certified EOS Implementer®. Some ran amazing companies, and some … not so much. I wouldn’t necessarily say the owners ran crappy companies. I mean they did, I just wouldn’t say that. But I have noticed that all great companies have five things in common.
What Makes a Company Really Great?
Running a successful business is more than just a healthy bottom line. Every year businesses break records of growth, retention, client and employee satisfaction … you name it. The leaders set incredibly high company goals, and amazingly the business nearly always achieves or exceeds them.
Team members seem to genuinely enjoy working with one another and have high expectations for themselves and their colleagues. They continually push each other to do better but in a positive way. Really great companies have employees who stay with them.
1. Great Companies Provide Great Training
Employees notice from their first day of onboarding how truly special a company is by its training and development programs. Companies that care about their employees ensure they have the tools, training, and professional development to continually do better.
Which came first? The rock star employee or the culture that created them? Competitors don’t care; they will want to steal them away regardless. If you have headhunters calling your employees, trying to (unsuccessfully) lure them away, you have a great company.
2. They Have a Great Culture
When people love to get to work each day and feel proud to work at their company, it shows. Employees serve as the best ambassadors for their companies by the way they talk about their employer.
A great culture starts with every seat on the Accountability Chart™ having the right person in it. Every person operates from their own personal unique abilities and understands how their role benefits the company’s goals.
3. Great Companies Celebrate All Their Employee Wins
Leaders of great companies take time to celebrate wins both large and small. And not just the obvious wins, like landing a big client. They know each individual’s win advances the goals of a team or a department. And ultimately, those small wins move the needle for the entire company.
Whether tech, sales, or operations, each team has goals it needs to accomplish to move the business forward.
4. They Are Great Predictors
Truly great companies can “see around corners.” They read department scorecards and reports on revenue, profits, issues, and people and look for areas for improvement. Then they take all the pieces and use them to formulate new directions for their teams.
Their leaders can predict the next trends in their industry and get ahead of competitors. They anticipate customer needs before the customers even realize they have them.
5. Great Companies Use a Great Operating System (EOS, Of Course)
Great companies have clear processes for every part of their business. And their leaders make sure those processes are followed by all.
They use EOS Tools to strengthen the Six Key Components™ of their businesses. That means they do things like have a clear Accountability Chart with all the right people in all the right seats. They IDS™ the heck out of their issues (meaning they Identify, Discuss, and Solve the root cause of problems forever). And they also keep up a consistent pulse of meetings annually, quarterly, and, of course, weekly (Level 10 Meetings™).
Bonus Round: Five Questions Great Company Leaders Ask Themselves
Contrary to common belief, every great company has to work hard to get (and stay) great. That doesn’t happen by writing some pretty words on paper and stuffing it in a drawer nobody looks in.
Leaders of great companies continually to ask themselves these questions, and answer them openly and honestly:
- Do we have the right people in the right seats to accomplish these five things?
- What Rocks or issues must we solve to do these five things?
- Does our Scorecard keep us on track?
- Is The Meeting Pulse™ aligned?
- Did we roll out EOS to the entire team and painted the picture with our State of the Company quarterly address?
EOS can help business owners get everything they want from their businesses. How does your company stack up? Take our Organizational Checkup™.
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