In this posting I will continue to write
about a great book I am reading, The 4
Disciplines of Execution: Achieving Your
Wildly Important Goals written by Chris McChesney, Sean Covey and Jim Huling. In my last
posting I explained the first Discipline, Focusing
on the Wildly Important and I clarified what the authors meant that to mean. I also told you that in many of
my blogs I have told you that if you try and improve everything, you’ll usually
end up improving nothing or at least very little. These authors are saying the same thing. So let’s now look at the second discipline, Act on the Lead Measures.
But before I present Discipline 2, let’s
first talk about the rules that are required to apply Discipline 1 across the
organization. The authors define Rule #1
as follows: No team focuses on more than
two WIG’s at the same time.
Personally, I am much more rigid in my belief that there should only be
one WIG, but we’ll go with the authors for now.
The authors explain that this rule acts like a governor on an
engine. Although there may be dozens of
goals across the organization, focus on the one WIG that is most important.
Rule # 2:
The battles you choose must win
the war. For this rule the authors
tell us that there’s a relationship between battles and wars, meaning that the
only reason you fight a battle is to win the war. In other words, the sole purpose of WIG’s at
lower levels in the organization is to help achieve the WIG’s at higher
level. That is, the lower-level WIG’s
must ensure the success of the higher level WIG’s. This concept is very much in line with how
Goal Trees are aligned. In a Goal Tree
we start with a single goal, but immediately beneath the goal are 3-5 Critical
Success Factors (CSF’s) which must be achieved if the organizations goal is to
be achieved. This is where the first
integration of Goal Trees and the wildly important goals (WIG’s) occurs. What I am saying here is that in addition to
the CSF’s articulated in the Goal Tree, I am proposing the inclusion of WIG’s
within the Goal Tree. Later on in my
postings I will demonstrate this visually.
Rule # 3:
Senior leaders can veto, but not
dictate. The authors tell us that “the
highest levels of execution are never reached when the strategy is devised
solely by the top leaders of the organization and simply handed down to the
leaders and teams below.” The point is, “without
involvement, you cannot create high levels of commitment that execution
requires.” “While the senior leaders
will undoubtedly determine the top-level WIG, they must allow the leaders at
each level below to define the WIG’s for their teams.” The authors explain that this not only
leverages the knowledge of these leaders, but also creates a sense of ownership
and involvement which are both critical to the success of any improvement
initiative.
Rule # 4:
All WIG’s must have a finish line
in the form of X and Y by when. For
me, this is one of the keys to success in that every WIG at every level must
contain a clearly measurable result. In
fact, when the WIG is articulated, it should contain a measurable target and a
finish line. For example, suppose you
state your WIG as something like, improve patient satisfaction. Written in this manner doesn’t provide enough
direction on either the target or by when.
But suppose you wrote your goal as something like, Improve patient
satisfaction from 81 percent to 93% by January 30th. Stating the WIG in this manner tells the team
where you are now, where you want to go and the deadline for achieving the goal. Written this way, the team now has the needed
clarity.
But what about lower level goals, or in the
case of the Goal Tree, the Critical Success Factors (CSF’s)? How should they be written? Quite simply, they should also be written in
the form of X and Y by when. The purpose
of the WIG is to inform the team of what winning the game looks like. The authors provide an analogy to explain why
clarity is so important. Suppose you
were playing a game of basketball, but you weren’t keeping score. Are you playing to win? No, it’s only when you are keeping score that
winning becomes important.
Another very important point here is the
difference between lagging and leading metrics. The WIG will always be a lagging indicator
simply because it is the result of actions taken to reach it….so it lags….it’s
a future indicator. A leading indicator
is measurable in real time and tells you if you are likely to achieve your goal.
Now let’s return to discussing Discipline 2: Act on the Lead Measures. The authors tell us that “lead measures must
be both predictive of achieving the
WIG and influenceable by the team.” Some comparative examples of the difference
between Lead and Lag Measures provided by the authors are as follows:
Team
|
Lag
Measure
|
Lead
Measure
|
Hospital
Quality Improvement
|
Decrease in mortality
rate in the hospital from 4% to 2% this year.
|
Evaluate susceptible
patients twice a day against pneumonia prevention protocols.
|
Restaurant
|
Increase average check
amount by 10% by year end.
|
Suggest the specialty
cocktail of the day to 90% of all tables.
|
Both of these lead measures are both
predictive and influenceable by the improvement team. If the team acts on the lead measure, they
will move the lag measure. The authors
explain that “acting on the lead measures is essential to superb performance,
but it is also the single most difficult aspect of installing 4DX in your team.” They further explain that there are three
reasons for this.
- “Lead measures can be counterintuitive. Most leaders focus on the lag measures because the bottom line results are what ultimately matter to them. But in reality, lag measures can’t be acted upon because they are the result of past actions taken.
- Lead measures are hard to keep track of. The authors explain that lead measures are measures of new and different behaviors and tracking behaviors is much harder than tracking results.
- Lead measures often look too simple. They demand a precise focus on a certain behavior that might look insignificant, particularly to those outside the team.”
The authors tell us that there are two
different types of lead measures. “Small outcomes are lead measures that
focus the team on achieving a weekly result, but give each member of the team
latitude to choose their own method for achieving it. The other type is leveraged behaviors that track the specific behaviors you want the
team to perform throughout the week. As
such, they provide a clear measurement of how well the team is performing. In other words, a leveraged behavior lead
measure holds the team accountable for performing the behavior, rather than
producing the result.” The authors
provide the following example.
What the authors are attempting to do is to
help you understand that it’s not a question of which is a better lead measure,
but rather it’s a question of which is a better lead measure for your team.
In the final section of this posting, the
authors present the steps for arriving at high-level lead measures.
Step 1:
Consider the possibilities. Begin
by brainstorming possible lead measures, but resist the temptation to choose
quickly. They recommend asking questions
like, “What could we do that we’ve never done before that might make all the
difference to the WIG.”
Step 2:
Rank by impact. When you’re
satisfied with your list of candidate lead measures, you’re ready to identify
the ideas that promise the greatest potential impact on the Team WIG.
Step 3:
Test top ideas. Once you’ve
identified some high-leverage lead measures, test them against these 6
criteria:
- Is it predictive? This is the most important test of all, so if it fails this one, reject it.
- Is it influenceable? Does the team have at least 80% control over the measure?
- Is it an on-going process of a “once and done”? Will it result in something habitual and not a one-time deal?
- Is it a leader’s game or a team game? The behavior of the team must drive the lead measure.
- Can it be measured? Success on lag measures absolutely requires successfully tracking the lead measure.
- Is it worth measuring? If it takes more effort than its impact is worth, it fails this test.
Step 4:
Define the lead measures. Ask
these questions.
- Are you tracking the team or individual’s performance?
- Are we tracking the lead measure daily or weekly. This should be at least weekly.
- What is the quantitative standard? How much/how often/how consistently are you supposed to perform?
- What is the qualitative standard? How well are you supposed to perform?
- Does it start with a verb? Simple verbs focus the mind immediately on action.
- Is it simple? State your lead measure in as few words as possible.
The deliverable for discipline 2 is a small
set of lead measures that will move the lag measure on the WIG.
In my next posting we’ll delve into
Discipline 3: Keep a compelling
scorecard. I encourage all of my readers to go get this book because it is full of great ideas and case studies. I am so thankful that I found it!!
Bob Sproull
