I loved the movies about the wild west of 19th century USA when I was a kid. A favourite line from the era was “Head ‘em off at the pass”. Meaning, the goodies (or baddies) needed to take a short cut cross country fast to get in front of the baddies (or goodies) to surprise
Reading the tea leaves is what most organisations are doing if they don’t do Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) well. They are trying to understand the past (lag KPIs) and predict the future (lead KPIs) with nefarious measures. Measures that are either: 1. Convenient – Typically plucked from a list of KPIs that seem to be
Decision maps are key to ensuring the right guidance for staff so they can make better decisions, quicker and with more confidence. The result is a more agile organisation. Who doesn’t want that? Anyone who has planned a family trip or tried ordering for a group at a restaurant knows how simple things are if
I love using this example of why you need to agree, and to operationalise, risk appetite for staff – to align the poles so to speak. It is not a corporate example. It is from every day living. Well not quite every day, but you will get the gist. I was “up the coast” one summer. A
Your staff come to work and bring their best selves (mostly). However, each ‘best self’ can have a different appetite for risk taking. If you haven’t already, survey their attitude to risk to their personal safety or their personal financial risk. Here in lies the need for them to understand the organisation’s appetite for risk