In my former profession, I had an “aspirational” passion around making sure that when people woke up and came to work in the morning, that they knew exactly how they contributed to the bottom line. I say “aspirational” because it was a goal we never quite achieved, but we got very close.
I worked at a start up within an established parent company. As a start-up, we had a very clear view of how the business made money and grew. But, like many organizations, we were very dependent on others in the larger company to execute. And, also like at many companies, a large portion of my compensation was paid in bonus tied to the results I produced. I’m a huge proponent of paying for results, but I would get really frustrated when I would see a peer in another organization succeed at the expense of my goals. It wasn’t done maliciously; it was just the way it was. We all have to make trade-offs, and sometimes, my business didn’t make the cut. It just didn’t make sense – to me (it hit my paycheck) or for the parent company who wouldn’t achieve the growth objectives for our product line.
Instead of continuing to get frustrated, I decided to start focusing on what I could control (my own organization) vs. what I couldn’t control (the actions of another business). I knew that if I experienced the pain of not reaching my goals because of what appeared to be competing objectives with interdependent organizations, that certainly the people in my organization were likely also experiencing something similar within our own business.
It was then that I brought in Bill Casey and Wendi Peck from Executive Leadership Group (ELG) to help me create a system of performance objectives for my organization that didn’t work at cross purposes or create win/lose situations. ELG developed a methodology that is based on MOPS (Measures of Performance). A MOP had to be specific and mutually exclusive of other MOPs assigned among peer executives in the organization. An important part of the process was setting parameters for each of the MOPS that clearly identified the negative results that we would need to avoid while supporting the delivery of own objective. For example, I would commit to delivering a set of products and programs that would meet our margin objectives without blowing out the network and causing customer service problems. The ELG process was grounded in our strategy and business model and we defined MOPS/parameters for three layers of the organization.
For the first time since we launched the business, we were collectively focused on the specific results needed to grow the company. Having these MOPS/parameters in place allowed us to refocus 500 people each time we had a change in direction from our parent company. From a leadership perspective, it was amazing how the organization was transformed. It was now relatively easy to redirect the business, respond to competition, and our team members were becoming much more collaborative and thoughtful as they worked cross functionally. I was also pleasantly surprised to see how empowered people felt and how appreciative they were to have their responsibilities defined with such clarity.
Now, as an executive recruiter/onboarding expert, my passion has shifted from creating clarity in my own organization to sharing my experience with new executives trying to make big impacts within our client partners’ companies. Tying performance to the business model is much easier said than done, but well worth the time and resources required to really make it work.
--Sue Schaefer, Partner, JivaroCXO
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