Strategic Discipline Blog

I played and officiated basketball. Somewhere I heard, “Basketball is a game of momentum.”

Business is similar. In my 22 years of coaching, I’ve seen businesses get on a roll. The momentum is contagious, inside, and outside the organization.

When your business produces great outcomes, revenue increases, customers are happier, referrals grow, momentum builds.

Engagement or Results

Gallup made a business out of measuring employee engagement. I’m sure you’ve either heard of the term employee engagement or Q12, which originated with Gallup and their groundbreaking book, First Break All the Rules, authored by Curt Coffman and Marcus Buckingham.  

Does employee engagement drive results or do results drive engagement?

In The 4 Disciplines of Execution, Chris McChesney, Sean Covey, and Jim Huling share, “Many believe that engagement drives results, and so do we. However, we know now and have witnessed consistently over the years, that results drive engagement. This is particularly true when the team can see the direct impact their actions have on the results. In our experience, nothing affects morale and engagement more powerfully than when a person feels he or she is winning. In many cases, winning is a more powerful driver of engagement than money, benefits packages, working conditions, whether you have a best friend at work, or even whether you like your boss, all of which are typical measures of engagement. People will work for money and they will quit over money, but many teams are filled with people who are both well paid and miserable in their jobs.”

The 4 Disciplines of Execution authors don’t necessarily disagree that engagement drives results, instead, they emphasize results are a more powerful determinant of engagement and performance than just engagement alone.

Build Results In Your Business

Winning, and getting results makes everyone more engaged.

The intention of every business then is to not only engage your team but to win, consistently.

If something is important, measure it. In my first coaching business as an E-Myth coach, Michael Gerber’s quote still resonates, “You can’t manage what you don’t measure, and what you don’t measure you don’t understand.”

Furthermore, Pearson’s Law exacerbates this corollary, “When performance is measured, performance improves. When performance is measured and reported back, the rate of improvement accelerates."

Everything points to the value of measuring performance, yet many businesses still believe the You Can’t Measure What I Do – Measuring Performance dilemma.

Too many measurements can cloud decision-making. Better to have too many measures than too few. The advantage of many is the ability to choose what actually drives your business and predicts performance. Measures that are leading indicators are most valuable since they forecast the direction performance is trending.

Accountability Builds Performance

Scaling Up’s People result is, “a harmonious culture of accountability.” Every position, every process, every department, and the business itself, requires performance metrics to measure performance and accountability. Measurements should cascade from the top to the front lines of your organization, and everyone should know each day if they are winning or losing.

Do your people know at the end of each day whether they’re winning or losing?

Plan for Success

On January 11^th you can learn how to create greater accountability and measurement in your organization. Attend our CEO + Leadership Bootcamp - Annual Planning Workshop to learn how to grow and improve your company and team’s performance.

To create an environment where everyone is inspired to give their best, contact Positioning Systems today to schedule a free exploratory meeting.

Growth demands Strategic Discipline.

“The oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is fear of the unknown.” 2023 is the unknown. Every business owner I’ve known wants predictability. That’s why systems are so popular. There are ways to build flexibility to meet the unknown with confidence. We’ll explore this, in the next blog.

Building an enduring great organization requires disciplined people, disciplined thought, disciplined action, superior results, producing a distinctive impact on the world.

Discipline sustains momentum, laying the foundations for lasting endurance over a long period.

A winning habit starts with 3 Strategic Disciplines: Priority, Metrics, and Meeting Rhythms.   Forecasting, accountability, individual, and team performance improve dramatically.

Meeting Rhythms achieve a disciplined focus on performance metrics to drive growth.

Let Positioning Systems help your business achieve these outcomes on the Four most Important Decisions your business faces:

Positioning Systems helps mid-sized ($5M - $250M+) businesses Scale-UP. We align your business to focus on Your One Thing! Contact dwick@positioningsystems.com to Scale Up your business! Take our Four Decisions Needs Assessment to discover how your business measures against other Scaled Up companies. We’ll contact you.

NEXT BLOG – Is A Recession Ahead? Prepare for the Unexpected