We Want to Expand But We Are Not Sure How
How do we expand?
Have you ever wondered what enables some entrepreneurs to exponentially grow their businesses while others go flat, or worse?
Their secret lies in their ability to find and lead what I call their “hidden” organisation.
“What is my hidden organisation?” you may ask.
We will help you uncover your hidden organisation what is in front of you in plain sight.
We will show you the Five Shortcuts to be undertaken to tap into your hidden organisation and grow your business by 25%.
Five Shortcuts to Grow Your Business by 25%
Shortcut Number 1 – Be the LEADER who thinks differently
The world is more complex and volatile today than at any other time in our history.
The tools of our modern existence are getting faster, cheaper, and smaller at an exponential rate, transforming every aspect of society, from business to culture and from the public sphere to our most private moments.
The old methods no longer cut through.
The people who succeed will be the ones who learn to think differently.
Shortcut Number ONE is “Be the LEADER who thinks differently.”
TAMSEN DONNER wrote in 1846: ”June 16th. We are now on the Platte, 200 miles from Fort Laramie. I never could have believed we could have travelled so far with so little difficulty. Indeed, if I do not experience something far worse than I have yet done, I shall say the trouble is all in getting started.”
Tamsen was travelling by wagon from Illinois to California, across the prairies and across the Rocky mountains. She was travelling knowing her destination.
She got started so, Let us get started!
Change is a challenge for every human.
I read in a local paper recently a letter written by a member of our community. Within what was being said a great statement was made that said: “change is like a four-letter word.” That is what my community thinks of change. I think all communities are equally challenged by change.
To get the change to happen and to stick:
Know why you are changing
The why of change is very important, important to you, your customers and to your staff, in fact to all your stakeholders – It is important to have everyone on the same page.
Know where you are going
Knowing where you are going will help your team understand what needs to be done and by whom. Starting just became whole a lot easier.
You and your team are – going from A to B and you state “We will increase our turn over from $2,650,000 to $3,315,000 and we will achieve that by December 15”
We will help you uncover your hidden organisation what is in front of you in plain sight.
Do you know where you are going and when you will get there?
If you do – great! Write it down and display it for all to see.
The secret to overcoming that challenge is to get started.
And here you are – you have started. Congratulations!
And once you have started, what you create becomes the seed for many other creations as what you have created is applied to a different purpose.
In 1895 the first moving pictures were presented to the public in Paris. What has that creation become when it has been applied to a different purpose by great thinkers?
Whether that be a movie that you recently enjoyed or the video conference that you had with a colleague on the other side of the world; or the virtual reality of a computer game.
All – use – a – moving – picture.
The 1890s may have been an age of innovation:
The then tallest building in the world, the Eiffel Tower, was opened in 1889 – over 300 metres high
Horseless carriages or motor vehicles had come into existence and were beginning to make obsolete previous sources of transport.
Electricity was beginning to be made available to households in cities around the world.
These initial inventions, being:
These are enabling inventions. Inventions create the opportunity for further innovations that use this technology.
The industrial revolution radically changed life then.
Your knowledge revolution will change your business now.
The future will be more than just the change you imagine
It will be more than you imagine possible
Some people are comfortable with how things were in the past. For example in 1978, Ken Olsen, the President of Digital Equipment Corp., a computer company that did become the second largest in the world stated: ‘There is no reason for an individual to have a computer in his home.’ Mr Olsen stuck to that belief, even after Apple and Microsoft proved the opposite to be true. Here is an interesting twist. Digital Equipment Corp. was eventually bought out by a company specialising in PCs.
We are all susceptible to misreading the technological tea leaves. We are all blinkered by our beliefs that were formed in the past. You cannot run a successful business and live a fulfilled life by always referring to the past, or just relying on your personal body of knowledge. That is like driving your car while looking in the rear-view mirror, it shows you what you have done, not what you need to do. Marshall Goldsmith has written a book titled ‘What got you here won’t get you there’ – A great statement to ponder in my view.
The full capacity of something new is not uncovered by its initial invention. The invention enables more innovation in the use of the original invention. Great on top of Good!
Is it the invention or the use and improvement of the invention? – What is more important?
I suggest what is important is whatever gets you the results you want in your business, and in your life.
Every change is made by the use of an invention in some form, so the key message is not “should we change?” but “what will we change?”
Change is to enable the results we want
The past has gotten you to where you are today, it will not get you to where you want to go. To go where you want to go, that is, gets the results you want, requires you to become a leader who thinks differently.
“How do I become a leader who thinks differently?“
We will show you the method to be a leader who thinks differently. We will show you the Nine Organising Principles that will help you to become a leader who Thinks Differently.
A simple lever can move a big rock, just as a good lead measure provider provides powerful leverage.
Shortcut Number 2 – Focus on the wildly important
Achieving Wildly Important Goals begins with selecting one or two of these goals.
Without a goal, you and your team will get lost in the whitewater of Business as Usual.
You will be looking at the Urgent of the ongoing demands of business and not looking at the Important. That is your wildly important goal.
We will show you a stepped process and provide supporting tools to ensure you have focused attention on the initiative you need to get done.
Shortcut Number 3 – Act on Lead Measures
The secret of this shortcut is excellence in execution. Lead measures must be predictive of achieving the wildly important goal and influenceable by the team.
Most Difficult Aspect
Acting on lead measures is essential to superb performance magic can be the single most difficult aspect of the shortcuts.
There are three reasons why:
- Lead measures are hard to keep track of.
- Being measures of new and different behaviours, and tracking behaviours are more difficult than tracking results. Lead measure tracking does not always fit with existing tracking mechanisms, so you may have to invent a system or use the one designed by our team.
- Lead measures can be counter-intuitive. Most leaders focus on lag measures, the bottom-line results that ultimately matter. This focus is to be expected.
Lead measures often look too simple
They demand a precise focus on certain behaviour that might look insignificant, particularly to those outside of the team.
Often, simply close the gap between knowing what to do and doing it. A simple lever can move a big rock, just as a good lead measure provider provides powerful leverage.
The deliverable for Shortcut # 3 is a small set of lead measures that will move the lag measure on your wildly important goal.
Shortcut Number 4 – Keep a compelling scoreboard
Involve your team in creating a compelling scoreboard. Having your team involved in the design results in their commitment to making the wildly important goal succeed.
Choose a theme
- Trendlines
- Speedometer
- Traffic Lights
Design the Scorecard
Once you’ve selected your theme and the type of scoreboard you want, the team should design the scoreboard with the following questions in mind:
Is it simple?
Don’t use the scoreboard to communicate reports status updates and other general information that distracts the team from the results they need to see. In the midst of whitewater simplicity is the key to keeping the team engaged.
Can the team see it easily?
Post the scoreboard where the team will see it often. The more visible the scoreboard, the more the team will stay connected to the game. If you want to motivate the team, even more, post it where other teams can see it as well.
Does it contain both lead and lag measures?
Include both actual results and target results. Scoreboard must answer not only – Where are we now? but also – Where should we be?
The team needs to see more than the number of units they produce each month, they can’t tell if they’re winning or losing. They need to see the number of units planned, it also helps to do the maths for them and show if they’re up or down on the goal. Include both the wildly important goal lag measure and the lead measures.
Include minimal labels to explain the measures. Don’t expect everyone knows what they are.
Can we see at a glance if we’re winning?
Design a scoreboard so that in 5 seconds or less the team can determine whether they are winning or losing.
Set in place team-based accountability where team members will be making commitments to their fellow team members and then they will be sure to follow through in a disciplined way.
Shortcut Number 5 – The Rhythm of Accountability
The fifth discipline is to create a rhythm of accountability
A rhythm of accounting for what was agreed to be undertaken in the previous cycle and committing what will be done in the coming cycle. The difference is that with accountability the execution actually happens.
You have set up the game in shortcuts 1, 2, 3 and 4 but until you apply shortcut 5 you and your team will not be in the game.
Why Rhythm?
Using this discipline brings the team members together and that is why it encompasses the other disciplines.
Many leaders define execution simply as the ability to set a goal and achieve it. In our opinion that is definitely insufficient. What is most difficult is the ability to achieve a critical goal in the Whitewater of business-as-usual.
In that Whitewater that demands urgent attention
In the world of today you and your team need to continue to address the needs of your existing business, although you wish to achieve more than that. You wish to achieve a wildly important goal, that requires accountability, that is additional to business as usual.
Shortcut number one brings a new way of thinking and shortcuts two, three and four bring focus, clarity and engagement which are powerful and necessary elements for your success but with shortcut number five you and your team ensure that the goal is achieved no matter what happens around you.
In most organisations accountability means an annual performance review. Such a review is a traditional management practice. What is needed to achieve a wildly important goal is a different form of accountability.
Team-based, accountability where team members will be making commitments to their fellow team members and they then will follow through in a disciplined way.
The wildly important goal session
Your team will meet at least weekly in a wildly important goal session. This meeting, which lasts 30 minutes, with an agenda, drives your weekly rhythm of accountability for driving progress towards the wildly important goal.
The focus of the wildly important goals session is simply to hold each other accountable for taking the action that will move the lead measures resulting in achieving the wildly important goal, despite the whitewater.
Easy to say, but hard to do.
Two Rules Must be Followed
The wildly important goals session should be held on the same day and at the same time every week. This consistency is critical, without which your team will never be able to establish a sustained rhythm of performance. Missing even a single week can cause a loss of momentum, and this will impact results.
Secondly, the whitewater is never allowed into the wildly important goal session. No matter how urgent the issue may seem to be, the wild the important goal session is limited solely to the actions and results that move the scoreboard. At first, this may be difficult to achieve but it is vitally important. To achieving the wildly important goal the two rules must apply.
That is what is needed to build the rhythm of accountability.
5 Shortcuts to grow your business by 25% in as little as 90 days. And that is just the start!!!
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