The pace of change in all aspects of our lives is increasing faster than ever. In order to just stay even, businesses, governments and non-profits must become more agile, more adaptable - in short they must accomplish one of the more difficult feats for large organizations - change.
Most change initiatives do not achieve the lofty goals they set out to accomplish. According to the authors, "When change programs fail, it's more often than not down to unproductive management behavior, unhelpful employee attitudes, or both."
But as Scott Keller and Colin Price, the authors, point out, it is not just change in operational efficiency which matters. Change focused on some narrow segment of performance only works in the short term and generally at a very high cost in terms of employee morale.
The authors based on very extensive research carried out over a multi-year period have developed a blue print for change that really works. There is equal emphasis on operational performance and the soft-side of business or what they call health. According to their research, "roughly 50 percent of performance variation between companies is accounted for by differences in organizational health."
In Part I of the book the authors advance the overall premise of the book. That sustained excellence is achieved by paying close attention to performance and health. When seeking to bring about change in any organization, you must focus on both performance and health. The authors have identified five questions which must be answered to bring about desired change.
They have grouped the questions under the following headings:
Aspire: Where do we want to go?
Assess: How ready are we to go there?
Architect: What do we need to do to get there?
Act: How do we manage the journey?
Advance: How do we keep moving forward?
They then break this down further by asking more detailed questions under the same heading for performance and for health.
Part II of the book deals with the five frames in much greater detail. They give examples of each frame in action, showing how various companies put these concepts into action.
Part III of the book ties all the information together.
The book is well written and full of very helpful examples of real life companies. There is plenty of research to back up the concepts they advance.
It is most applicable to larger organizations. While it is easy to understand the theory, I suspect that most companies would do well to seek assistance in trying to implement the study and measurement of the health of their organization. But based on the case studies in the book, the cost of such help is insignificant in relation to the payback.
The information in this book is very compelling. Many books have proclaimed the old command and control management is outdated. But this book takes the soft skills of management - the health of organizations - and shows clearly how it affects the bottom line.
A very important book which should be read and studied and the concepts implemented if you want your organization to be on the leading edge.
Beyond Performance: How Great Organizations Build Ultimate Competitive AdvantageScott Keller and Colin Price acknowledge that although there is a "multitude" of books about business leadership and management already in print (actually, Amazon now offers 16,075 titles), they believe that "no other work offers what we are trying to provide. Our approach combines two views. The first view is of a `stable equilibrium' state of organizational excellence in which high performance can be sustained; the second is of the dynamics of the transition required to reach that state...by combining static and dynamic views of organizations, we aim to arrive at a fuller understanding of their fundamental nature. To that end, we aim to shift the `installed base' of management thinking'...Our central message is focusing on organizational health - which we define as the ability of your organization to align, execute, and renew itself faster that your competitors can - is just important as focusing on the traditional drivers of business performance."
With all that clarified up front, Keller and Price then carefully guide their reader through a five-stage process (appropriately identified as the "5 As") for developing capabilities beyond their current potentialities for performance in order to achieve and then sustain "ultimate competitive advantage." Frankly, I am astonished by the fact that so many C-level executives still do not fully understand that their organization's #1 competitor tomorrow will be what it offers today. Today's performance is measured in terms of specific results. By nature, results occur at the conclusion of a process of effort. The challenge is to become so "healthy" as an organization that the capabilities are there to align, execute, and renew faster than the competition so that the organization can sustain exceptional performance over time.
Keller and Price identify and then discuss what they characterize as the "Nine Elements of Organizational Health." Let's take a brief look at the first five practices that underpin organizational health:
1. Direction: Shared vision, strategic clarity, and employee involvement/engagement
Question: What is the ultimate destination
2. Leadership: Authoritative, consultative, supportive, and challenging
Question: Who will take us there?
3. Culture and climate: Open and trusting, internally competitive, operationally disciplined, and creative and entrepreneurial
Question: Do we really believe in the power of first-person plural pronouns?
4. Accountability: Role clarity, performance contracts, consequence management, and personal ownership
Question: Do we have almost total buy-in on who we are, what we do, how we do it, and why?
5. Coordination and control: People performance review, operational management, and financial management
Question: Do we do what is most important, constantly improve what we do, and measure it?
The other four elements are Capabilities, Motivation, External Orientation, and Innovation and learning. Keller and Price rigorously examine within five frames (i.e. the "5 As"): Aspire ("Where do we want to go?"), Assess, ("How ready are we to go there?") Architect ("What do we need to do to get there?"), Act ("How do we manage the journey?), and Advance (""How do we keep moving forward?"). In Part II, Keller and Price devote a separate chapter to each and then in Part III, help their reader to pull it all together. More specifically, they examine the senior leader's role, how the five separate but interconnected frames can help to make an organization even "healthier," and finally, which specific challenges their reader will probably encounter and how the information, insights, and counsel in the book can help the reader to respond effectively to those challenges.
Some readers will accept Keller and Price's challenge to prepare for the future, others won't. Some will then succeed, others won't. If the road to hell is paved with good intentions, the road to failure in business is paved with "nice tries." I agree with the Jedi Master, Yoda: "Do or do not. There is no try." - E-reader - Kindle Devices - Strategy - Ebook'
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