Predictable Success

Why did I choose this resource?

I chose this resource to understand what predicable success is and how to achieve it.

What did you learn from it?

I learned the stages to achieving predictable success as well as how to maintain it. I also learned the actions to avoid entering the decline stages.

Key Knowledge

• Predictable Success – the point at which an organization dependably realizes its goals
• Growth Stages
  • First Growth Stage: “Early Struggle”
    • first three years
    • establish a market for your product/service
    • evaluate progress toward establishing a market at the end of every workday
    • discover where your customers are
    • constantly alter your product to learn what your customers are fond of
    • be open to modifying your companies business plan, strategy, and “core values”
  • Second Growth Stage: “Fun”
    • business booms, rapid growth
    • concentrate on selling to the market
    • state of change, extreme flexibility
  • Third Growth stage: “Whitewater”
    • systems and processes
    • hire first-rate operations manager
    • unite sales and operations, create a new company structure
  • “Predictable Success”
    • Decision making
    • Goal setting
    • Alignment
    • Accountability
    • Ownership
• Decline Stages
  • First Decline Stage: “Treadmill”
    • too many systems and processes
    • too much emphasis on “how” instead of “what”
    • failure to grow
    • employee complacency / frustrated management
    • difficult to escape
    • find a way to view your organization through different eyes
  • Second Decline Stage: “The Big Rut”
    • too much time spent in the “Treadmill” stage
    • company leaders become complacent
    • “visionary” employees leave
    • company stifles creativity
    • customers are viewed as an annoyance
    • decisions made based on comfort
    • escaped by major interventions
  • Third Decline Stage: “Death Rattle”
    • the point of no return
    • organization fails due to
      • major decline in resources
      • refusal to evolve with technology
      • customer abandonment
• Approaching Predictable Success – Building a Machine for Decision Making
  • Organization chart – who influences decision making
  • Lateral management roles – develop relationship with other managers
  • Alignment – employees actions reflect company goals
  • Cross-functional teams – all departments must work harmoniously together
  • Empowerment – team members trust and rely on each other
  • Ownership and self-accountability – managers able to “pull” employees instead of “push”
• Returning to Predictable Success – Building “Dynamic, People-Oriented Systems”
  • Hiring – from within and outside the company, be willing to move people laterally
  • Deployment – explain to new workers why specific tasks are assigned to them
  • Performance assessment – have a conversation with the employee
  • Training – engage the new hire during training
  • Mentoring and coaching – assign mentors laterally, trust is built
  • Ownership and self-accountability – employees take ownership of their actions

How are you using what you learned?

I am using what I learned to gain a better understanding of where our company is on its road to predicable success and how to move forward.

Key Changes / Key Actions

• Create an organization chart
• Discover where the company is and create a plan to work towards predictable success

Source

• Name : Predictable Success
• Author : Les McKeown
• getAbstract.com: Link to Book