Last week the Associated Press reported that "Worker productivity, the
key factor in rising living standards, slowed sharply in the final three
months of the year while wage pressures increased." This drop in
productivity coupled with the news that the service sector shrank for
the first time in five years has many economists talking about how big
the impending recession will be rather than debating whether one will occur.
At tpc we have long advocated enabling IT efforts and structures to
increase organizational productivity. Many of you are familiar with
Tom's rants on the white collar revolution and the advent of white
collar robots. We also believe there is another, powerful mechanism for
improving productivity. People will become more productive when they
want to become more productive! And they want to when their output is
moving the organization closer to a compelling shared purpose, vision,
or what we call "Ambition" in our Future Shape of the Winner model.
Many of us have probably known someone in the workforce who was going
through the motions, fulfilling their job duties with no particular
zeal, and sometimes even beginning their retirement while they were
still on the payroll. And yet this same person may be a hardworking
volunteer for a charitable organization they believe in. The difference
is having a purpose that has real meaning. Being part of something that
really matters! And improving the return for investors (although the
lifeblood of a successful business) is not compelling enough to pull out
that voluntary discretionary effort we all have available. It has to be
a statement of the common cause for the common good.
That is why we advise our clients to start with ambition. Who do we
intend to be and what part might the individual members play? Why does
it matter? When it is important, it becomes a "want to" driver, rather
than the "have to" necessities of my job. And the work we perform when
we want to is always more productive than the work we do because we have to.
What do you think? Agree or disagree that it's the place to start in
your strategic plan? Can that raise productivity? Do you have any ideas
for building passion through purpose?
<http://www.tompeters.com/cgi-bin/mt/mt-tb.cgi?__mode=view&entry_id=10263>Posted
by Mike Neiss for Tom Peters
No comments:
Post a Comment