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Aligning minds and what that means

Written by: Graham Little

Article Overview: If we are to align staff actions with goals and strategies then it is essential that we understand how to align minds.

Aligning minds and what that means

People ‘see’ any situation according to the transparency they use and will act according to that content of that transparency.
Applying the hypothesis to a person at work we can now state that one of the crucial things required is for them to have a very clear ‘transparency’ of what is expected of them at work and how to go about achieving the results. The OPD strategic human resource system delivers exactly this, and we now have the experience to assert firmly that current ‘job descriptions’, and ‘goal setting’ and ‘performance management systems’, do not deliver any where near adequate detail to achieve the gains in human performance that are achievable.
Think of the use of visualization in sport, every sports person knows today the importance of ‘seeing’ the act, seeing for example the golf ball and seeing the stroke and visualizing he ball traveling to where you wish to place it on the green, etc. This goes far beyond ‘hit the ball and put in on the green using a five iron’, for example. The written description of the action may include the statement of hitting the ball with the five iron, but the visualization must go beyond this, so the person sees themselves doing exactly the actions needed, which then ‘presets’ the person to do as required.
Visualization does not guarantee results, but it certainly adds to the likelihood of success. If this is an important process for optimizing human performance in sport, do you think business any different?
There is a second important aspect of the use of transparencies. To be effective as a coach you must have a transparency where you can ‘see’ excellence in whatever it is you wish to coach; and this applies in business as much as in any sport.
Are the rules any different if you seek to coach yourself? This means that if you are to coach another, or coach yourself, then it is essential you have a transparency whereby you can ‘see’ excellence in both the efforts of another and in your own efforts.
We can now redraft our hypothesis as follows.
People ‘see’ any situation according to the transparency they use and will act according to that content of that transparency. In business this means that each person must be clear on what is expected of them (outputs or key performance indicators - KPIs) and the key actions that best enable the KPIs to be achieved. Also, it is not sufficient for the person to know the written sets of outputs and actions; they need to be able to visualize what to do and to ‘see’ themselves doing it.
Aligning minds in the business then requires:
 Aligning outputs and KPIs in each role relative to the strategy.
 Aligning the actions needed to achieve each KPI.
 Guiding people to have this structure clear on their transparency related to ‘what I do in my job’.
 Guiding people to visualize themselves doing the actions related to the written description of excellence in their job.

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Article Tags: adequate detail, coach, five iron, goal setting, golf ball, guarantee results, human performance, human resource system, hypothesis, job descriptions, likelihood, performance management systems, sports person, strategic human resource, stroke, transparencies, transparency, visualization



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