Let me just screen-cap this for you to make it easier:
Now let’s break this down by the “parent category” of those six:
- Vision or strategy
- Communications
- People/hiring
- Results/data
- Learning
- Self-awareness
OK, good start.
Now let’s run through a few issues with those six buckets:
- Most senior leaders aren’t entirely clear what “strategy” is, often confusing it with operations
- Communications? ROFL. Show me that on a balance sheet and I’ll show you people caring.
- Hiring? ROFLMAO. It runs through HR. It’s a series of checked boxes. No one cares, so long as they can say “A-Players” a few times at an all-hands meeting.
- A lot of execs aren’t really clear on data either.
- We supposedly live in “The Knowledge Economy,” but we don’t focus much on “learning” within our orgs
- Most people aren’t very self-aware, especially guys/girls with a lot of power
So now we’ve got a problem. Six big buckets about what leaders need to do.
All seem logical.
But all six aren’t very normative within organizations.
Hmmm.
What would be the path through here?
There is no real path through because white-collar companies need to focus on making money and paying people — until robots and software suites come for some of those people.
As a result, the “true stakeholders” of any place will always focus on the money first.
When you focus on the money first, all this other stuff — communications, strategy, hiring, etc. — slides down the ladder of “this needs to be done.”
That’s the inherent problem.
Soooo…
Let’s see if we can offer a checklist for what could b
- Make money
- Strategize about how to make more money
- Look at your people and see who might be able to help with that
- Move people around to value-add roles
- Only hire when you really need to, not because someone is claiming to be busy
- Talk to employees about what they’re experiencing and feeling
- Take that into account as you go forward
- Think about your own life and don’t make it all about work
- Connect strategy and execution
- Etc.
For most people, “make more money // show growth” overcomes all of this. That’s the sad part. That’s why so many are disengaged with work.
If we just spend maybe 10-20 minutes/day thinking outside of the financial metrics, we can be better leaders and drive better orgs. But we’re a long way off from that.
