The Advantage: Why Organizational Health Trumps Everything Else In Business

by Patrick Lencioni

alignment is about creating so much clarity that there is as little room as possible for confusion, disorder, and infighting to set in.

there is no way that their employees can be empowered to fully execute their responsibilities if they don’t receive clear and consistent messages about what is important from their leaders across the organization.

most mission statements have neither inspired people to change the world nor provided them with an accurate description of what an organization actually does for a living.

alignment and clarity cannot be achieved in one fell swoop with a series of generic buzzwords and aspirational phrases crammed together.

What leaders must do to give employees the clarity they need is agree on the answers to six simple but critical questions and thereby eliminate even small discrepancies in their thinking.

These are the six questions: 1. Why do we exist? 2. How do we behave? 3. What do we do? 4. How will we succeed? 5. What is most important, right now? 6. Who must do what?

answering these questions requires time. Not months, but certainly a few days up front followed by a little more time in the following weeks to fully bake the answers. Taking

QUESTION 1: WHY DO WE EXIST?

identify its underlying reason for being, also known as its core purpose.

So how does an organization go about figuring out why it exists? It starts by asking this question: “How do we contribute to a better world?”

the next question that needs to be asked, and asked again and again until it leads to the highest purpose or reason for existence, is Why? Why do we do that?

QUESTION 2: HOW DO WE BEHAVE?

The answer to the question, How do we behave?, is embodied in an organization’s core values, which should provide the ultimate guide for employee behavior at all levels.

QUESTION 3: WHAT DO WE DO?

QUESTION 4: HOW WILL WE SUCCEED?

an organization’s strategy is simply its plan for success.

Strategic anchors provide the context for all decision making and help companies avoid the temptation to make purely pragmatic and opportunistic decisions that so often end up diminishing a company’s plan for success.

QUESTION 5: WHAT IS MOST IMPORTANT, RIGHT NOW?

two of the most maddening day-to-day challenges companies face: organizational A.D.D. and silos.

Most organizations I’ve worked with have too many top priorities to achieve the level of focus they need to succeed.

The result is almost always a lot of initiatives being done in a mediocre way and a failure to accomplish what matters most.

“If everything is important, nothing is.”

Of course, to say that there are too many top priorities is something of an oxymoron.

And even if there are multiple big priorities, ultimately one of those has to be at the very top.

every organization, if it wants to create a sense of alignment and focus, must have a single top priority within a given period of time.

A thematic goal is … Singular. One thing has to be most important, even if there are other worthy goals under consideration.

Temporary. A thematic goal must be achievable within a clear time boundary, almost always between three and twelve months.

If we accomplish only one thing during the next x months, what would it be?

QUESTION 6: WHO MUST DO WHAT?

people are skeptical about what they’re being told unless they hear it consistently over time.

The world is full of organizations where employees feel uninformed and in the dark even though they have access to more glossy newsletters, interactive Web sites, and overly produced employee meetings than they need or want. What they don’t get is consistent, authentic, and relevant communication.

Healthy organizations believe that performance management is almost exclusively about eliminating confusion.

They realize that most of their employees want to succeed, and that the best way to allow them to do that is to give them clear direction, regular information about how they’re doing, and access to the coaching they need.

The best performance management programs—you guessed it—are simple. Above all else, they are designed to stimulate the right kinds of conversations around the right topics.