I recently facilitated a review of a company’s culture and values at their quarterly executive team meeting and an interesting discovery was made by the CEO.
The company is a young vibrant organisation in Pharmacy Health Services. It was started by a young entrepreneurial leader which has grown the company from small beginnings to a recently public listing on the ASX. What this has meant is that the some of the key people who started at the beginning have not adjusted to change and grown with the company.
Also that since it is rapid growth which brings with it change, it was clear that the culture of the company had to be such that the team would cope with such change, embrace growth and develop a championship team set of values.
From some recent negative team issues it was clear a review of current values was needed. Using our facilitation process we spend as much time as is needed on what is the company’s purpose? Simply put it means as a team “Why do we exist?”
We have really seen the effect of this on organisations. In short, the establishment of a clear central purpose is the starting point of all success. Once this is clear, then everything else; the vision (overall objective), the mission (how we will do this), and the values (our behaviours) all flow.
This brings me back to my beginning story. At this team review day when they began looking at their current values and what behaviours would be needed to embrace the rapid growth the leader of the company had a revelation. Our purpose is all wrong! He then went into an analysis of how this had happened and his conclusion was that last year at a similar event he wanted to please the team so had them come up with the overall purpose and hence direction of the company. It was now clearly skewed away from what would make this company great. The purpose was all wrong, hence the current issues he was facing.
What this highlighted to me is this. The leader needs to set the direction of the organisation, including the behaviours that the team should live by. Yes they should include key persons in the establishment of the purpose, but ultimately it the leader of the organisation who should provide the visions and direction.
By allowing his team to develop the overall direction he had in fact been highjacked by employees that had their own agenda.
Establishing a simple statement for the purpose of your organisation, the very essence of why it exists at all can take time and be very confronting but without it, it is very hard to make all the other human aspects of the business work effectively. This statement should be clear, powerful, unique, and above all no more than a few words.
What is the purpose of your business? And does everyone on the organisation know that?
Purpose is the Starting Point of Success - To learn more about this author, visit Geoff Flemming's Website.
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Geoff Flemming
(Visit Geoff's Website)
5 years experience in working with a range
of small to medium businesses - turning
good businesses and organisations into
extraordinary ones.
In the last 16 years Geoff has had
extensive experience running a range of
small businesses. His previous business,
SME Solutions has been expanded nationally
and is enormously successful. It is still
run by Greg Carter.
Prior to that Geoff was a partner and
Director of Total Business Solutions, an
agency owned by Geoff and also Peter
Coulson and Darrell Hardidge. Since then
both Peter and Darrell have moved onto
other very successful ventures.
Geoff's experience in working and coaching
business around Australia ranges from
engineering and fabrication businesses, to
manufacturing, distributuion, importing
and service businesses as well as retail
including large nurseries, salons and
restaurants.
Geoff has a passion for leadership and
organisational development. His presence
in leading, coaching and inspiring is well
known and he is quickly developing into a
well known and sought after speaker.
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