It's been interesting to see how commentators about the economic situation in Greece have been largely lagging the situation. First, most of them started on "Greece must (and will) sort itself out, default is not an option", with exit from the euro an unmentionable and almost unimaginable event. Then, the tone moved on to "default could theoretically happen, but it won't - and it shouldn't - because the other governments will put such pressure on the Greek government that they will be forced to do what they should", through "it might happen, but that would be a disaster (which of course we will avoid)", and now starting to come to "it might happen if we're not careful", and a few brave souls at "actually, default and exit from the euro is the best hope Greece has". Of course, as and when Greece does default and leave the euro, there will be detailed discussion of 1) why that was always inevitable and 2) why it was a still bad idea. When you see this sort of drift in comment from established "opinion leaders", it's a good reminder of how unpredictable the world can be.
Not just decision-making, Decision Power
A key factor in business success is often said to be good decision-making. But it's a mistake to focus too narrowly on the decision itself. There's a broader organisational ability that connects your "openings for action" with the results you want to deliver. I call that capability Decision Power. Making a decision is only one step on the road to results, not even the first one. Before you can make a decision you must recognise there's a decision to be made. Then you need to creatively shape and evaluate the choices - the good ones aren't always immediately obvious. Of course, after the decision you do need to take action. And, having done so, you need to make sure you get the intended results.
In many businesses, these steps are separated from each other, often leading to delayed action and reduced impact. The way in which a decision is made has a huge impact on the speed and completeness of its implementation - yet this is often ignored in an attempt to make the "best" decision.
In today's complex and fast-changing world, business leaders need to move beyond trying to optimise their decision-making. They need to consider how much Decision Power their organisation has - and what their role is in building it.
What's the meaning of your business?
If there's an industry that's been through a more disruptive and challenging time over the last few years than the music business, then I don't know it. And, within the music business, I don't think there's been a bigger distraction from the challenges at hand than the Terra Firma / Citibank saga. In light of that, it's encouraging to see what, as reported in The Guardian, EMI's chief executive, Roger Faxon, said recently to their employees about becoming owned by Citibank:
"The history, tradition and heritage of this company cannot, and will not, be erased by a change in shareholding. We are EMI not because of who owns us, but because of who we are - the home of the greatest artists and songwriters of the past, present and future."
A great example of knowing, and being able to communicate, the meaning, the real identity, of a business. Which, despite what some leaders say, is almost never "growing shareholder value". That's just something you have to do. Like breathing: you do it, but it's not what life's about.
In the midst of change, turmoil and distraction, a strong sense of what your business is really about - and how you personally contribute to that - is perhaps your biggest asset. What's the meaning of your business?
The Hidden Limit to Change
Many organisations struggle to react fast enough to the ever-increasing rate and unpredictable nature of strategic change. Sometimes that's because it's not clear what needs to be done. However, even when that's obvious, leaders face huge difficulty in getting change to happen quickly enough.
Let's Take It Up Again...
Not long ago, I facilitated a strategy session with the management team of a new business within a leading financial services company. They had big hopes for the business, but faced questions about which specific goals to pursue and how to go after them. The team felt it was critical to get these questions resolved, so had set aside time to focus on them - and had brought us in to help.
As we always do, we were working hard to get tangible outputs, to get clear actions nailed down. But, to my great frustration and embarrassment, there were still some fundamental questions unresolved at the end. I expected we would form a sub-group to get together to carry things forward, meeting again perhaps later the next day or - at worst - later in the week. Instead, the collective decision was: "let's take it up again...next month".
Organisational Clockspeed
Now, I'm not criticising that team: they had deeply engrained habits for operating on a monthly "clockspeed" basis.
And, they aren't alone. Through our work with multiple clients, we've identified clockspeed as an often-hidden constraint on the rate of change. We've found that each organisation has a clockspeed, a heartbeat as it were, that determines how fast it can make decisions - and therefore how fast they can move. For many businesses, the clockspeed for the top team is monthly at best.
In most large organisations this clockspeed was set years, if not decades, ago - when the pace of change was much slower. The things that determine this clockspeed are usually invisible: at least to employees, for whom they are like water to a fish, just part of "the way things are". As a result, leaders often don't address these factors, and therefore their change initiatives don't have the impact they desire.
Tesco: the empire starts to crumble
Tesco. You just have to love them. Tremendously successful, innovative, with a straightforward mission well delivered. Their high-water mark is still some years away, I suspect.
But when the corporate history of their decline is written, the turning point will be seen as the sending of heir apparent Tim Mason off on a "must win" mission in the US - a mission that will inevitably fail. They are in essence taking on the entire US grocery system - without most of the advantages they have in the UK.
The amount of top team time already taken up on discussions about Fresh and Easy, and the huge investment, will shrink into insignificance as they feed ever more money, expertise, and reputation into an losing battle.
In the meantime, the widely discussed "brain drain" continues.