First and most obvious, bring out the three old warhorses of competition – cost, quality, and service – and drive them to new levels, making every person in the organization see them for what they are, a matter of survival.
Set stretch goals. Don’t ever settle for mediocrity. The key to stretch is to reach for more than you think is possible. Don’t sell yourself short by thinking that you’ll fail.
When there’s change, there’s opportunity.
You can look at the situation and feel victimized. Or you can look at it and be excited about conquering the challenges and opportunities it presents.
Effective people know when to stop assessing and make a tough call, even without total information. Little is worse than a manager who can’t cut bait.
The mission announces exactly where you are going, and the values describe the behaviors that will get you there.
When you are a leader, your job is to have all the questions. You have to be incredibly comfortable looking like the dumbest person in the room. Every conversation you have about a decision, a proposal, or a piece of market information has to be filled with you saying, “What if?” and “Why not?” and “How come?
Underneath, you would surely see that the best care passionately about their people – about their growth and success. And you would see that they themselves are comfortable in their own skins. They’re real, filled with candor and integrity, optimism and humanity.
Differentiation favors people who are energetic and extroverted and undervalues people who are shy and introverted, even if they are talented.
When you own your choices, you own their consequences.
The third way is less common and certainly less of a layup – a culture of integrity, meaning a culture of honesty, transparency, fairness, and strict adherence to rules and regulations. In such cultures, there can be no head fakes or winks. People who break the rules do not leave the company for “personal reasons” or to “spend more time with their families.” They are hanged – publicly – and the reasons are made painfully clear to everyone.
There are no finite answers to many questions. What really counted was your thought process.
Life is too short to spend every day doing something you don’t love.
Indeed, the biggest winners in the world are those who answer yes to the question, “Am I living the life I choose?
People development should be a daily event, integrated into every aspect of your regular goings-on.
Tell them to grab on to the career that engages their brain and heart and soul and gives them meaning. Tell them that eventually, the money will come, and if it doesn’t, in time, they will find themselves rich with something money can’t buy. And that, obviously, would be happiness.
At the end of the day, effective mission statements balance the possible and the impossible. They give people a clear sense of the direction to profitability and the inspiration to feel they are part of something big and important.
When you are an individual contributor, you try to have all the answers. That’s your job – to be an expert, the best at what you do, maybe even the smartest person in the room. When you are a leader, your job is to have all the questions. You have to be incredibly comfortable looking like the dumbest person in the room. Every conversation you have about a decision, a proposal, or a piece of market information has to be filled with you saying, “What if?” and “Why not?” and “How come?
Companies win when their managers make a clear and meaningful distinction between top- and bottom-performing businesses and people, when they cultivate the strong and cull the weak. Companies suffer when every business and person is treated equally and bets are sprinkled all around like rain on the ocean.
Only satisfied customers can give people job security. Not companies.
Look, winning and losing can’t be quantified. They are states of mind, and losing happens only when you give up. Seen that way, then, the world can be filled with winners, and there is room for them all.