Whenever I make a business decision and whenever I study the truly successful companies globally I find a powerful and simple similarity: Look to improve all the lives involved in any decision and profit will follow. Sure, you can ignore this in the short-term and simply look to benefit yourself, but in the long term the companies that earn the greatest profit (financially, emotionally, socially, etc.) are the companies that look to serve a greater cause than money.
The challenge is that in order to do this the leadership, and especially the ownership, of the organisation has to be focused on total wealth creation at all levels. This means that:
- Leadership and ownership needs to overcome self-centered motivations and focus on the progress of all as the only progress.
- This awareness and attitude has to be woven into the fabric of the organisation in order to have any effect. This is done by aligning policy, systems and processes throughout.
- The last major step is to recruit according to the purpose and attitude as indicated above and then allow as much freedom directed by the mutual vision and aligned outcomes. Get out of the way of the people you trust or risk losing losing your business.
So how is your vision and purpose?
How do your systems align?
How do you treat your fellow vision builders in the organisation?
Too frequently I see senior decision-makers ignoring these basic laws of nature that engender focus and clarity. They try to substitute with measures of control in order to mitigate risk. Wow! So boring. Let’s rather talk about trust, autonomy, mastery, purpose, growth and life! Let’s create businesses that create. Let’s create organisations that learn from failure and praise those who dare to risk new processes, systems or relationships in the name of growth and development.
Let me know how I can help.