The Clifton Review
The Clifton Review is a tri-weekly column that examines the question of the Clifton project along with the evolution of the war between two billionaires. We covered the start of this war with articles describing the battle over easement rights, the mysterious burning of a home, the blocks to rebuilding, and countless questionable court filings.
While the 2018 series salutes fashion mogul Peter Nygård’s Golden Jubilee detailing his rags to riches story, his incredible business success over these past fifty years and an inside look at how he did it, The Clifton Review will also continue to address current affairs as they relate to the good of The Bahamas.
Achieving Peak Performance In Business
By P.J. Malone
Everybody will tell you that they want their cars ‘firing on all cylinders’ if you asked the question. It should be the same way in business. Every entrepreneur should want their business firing on all cylinders, though this is easier said than done.
Firing on all cylinders means every part of your organization has to be performing at an optimal level and then working together as a whole unit toward achieving the business goals. This principle is referred to as ‘organizational alignment’.
Achieving organizational alignment is possible through individual focus on efficiencies and effectiveness of the various parts of your organization. Authors Jonathan Trevor and Barry Varcoe of the Harvard Business Review article, “How Aligned Is Your Organization?” shares some insights on what businesses can do to align their organizations, which should prove helpful.
In this excerpt, they advise asking yourself the following questions and explain how it should work:
Enterprise purpose: What do we do and why do we do it? Purpose is the loadstone upon which every enterprise is built… What is the enduring purpose of your enterprise? Why would it matter if you went out of business tomorrow, and who would care? Is your purpose clear enough that your investors, employees, partners, and customers could articulate it?
Business strategy: What are we trying to win at to fulfill our purpose? If purpose is what the enterprise exists to achieve and why it matters, then business strategy is planning for what the enterprise must win at to fulfill its purpose. Unlike its purpose, an enterprise’s strategy should flex and morph in response to future opportunities and threats. The degree to which your enterprise’s business strategy fulfills its purpose is the measure of its effectiveness.
Consider the following strategic questions for your own enterprise: What are your offerings to customers, in the form of products and services, and are they consistent with your purpose? What’s missing? What do you do or offer that you shouldn’t? Who are your customers, and what are they demanding of the products and services you offer, now and in the future? Who are your competitors, and what are they capable of offering that you aren’t? How do you need to be different to compete and win?
Organizational capability: What do we need to be good at to win? Business strategy receives the lion’s share of executives’ attention, but even the best strategy is useless unless supported by appropriate organizational capabilities. It is a reckless leadership team that commits to a business strategy without knowing whether they can achieve it.
Consider your own organizational capabilities: What do you need to be really good at to successfully achieve your winning strategy? What are you capable of organizationally that your rivals are not? How do you become uniquely capable of fulfilling what markets and customers are demanding of you, now and in the future?
Resource architecture: What makes us good? (And how good are we?) Strategically aligned enterprises are made capable by their organizational resources, including people, structures, cultures, and work processes, and by the degree to which they are configured to be strategically valuable. People reflect the value of skills, experience, and knowledge required to perform the enterprise’s work; structure reflects the value of formal and informal relationships, networks, and functional connections through which work is structured; processes reflect the value of planned and ad hoc work processes and routines through which work is performed, and in which valuable knowledge is retained organizationally; and culture reflects the values, beliefs, and attitudes that guide everyday working behavior.
Consider your own resources: What type of people are core to you being superior at the things you need to be good at to win? What type of culture might support collaboration between complementary lines of business, if your business strategy depends upon it? What types of work processes are critical to your ability for inventiveness? What type of structure will enable you to be agile enough to compete for and win fickle customers repeatedly?
Management systems: What delivers the winning performance we need? Management systems include all aspects of management infrastructure, operations, and tactics, from information systems to employee performance management. What management practices, systems, and technologies best fit your winning strategy for fulfilling your enterprise’s purpose? What are appropriate measures of success, both short and long term? (HRB.org)
Lots of things to consider, but if mastered, it can yield exponential growth for your business.
