The High-Velocity Edge

by Steven J. Spear

There is a dynamic difference between the high-velocity leaders and those chasing them that generates speed. High-velocity organizations are constantly experimenting and learning more about all the work they do; this is how they cope successfully with the complexity which they all face in one form or another. These organizations do not encourage or admire workarounds, firefighting, and heroic measures. They want to understand and solve problems, not put up with them.

Managers in high-velocity organizations make sure that a regular part of work is both the delivery of products and services and also the continual improvement of the processes by which those products and services are delivered. They teach people how to make continual improvement part of their jobs and provide them with enough time and resources to do so. Thus, the organization’s ability to be both reliable and highly adaptive becomes self-reinforcing. This is a fundamental difference from their also-ran competitors. High-velocity managers are not in place to command, control, berate, intimidate, or evaluate through a contrived set of metrics, but to ensure that their organizations become ever more self-diagnosing and self-improving, skilled at detecting problems, solving them, and multiplying the effect by making the solutions available throughout the organization.