Most Viewed

I have a love/hate relationship with IKEA. On the one hand they sell exceptionally cost-effective furnishings that can often look good for the price. On the other hand I so often find that the frustration of dealing with their products overshadows the money I save.

Take the shelving system I bought last weekend for example: they didn't include the screws needed for attaching the shelves. Worse though, when I opened the “instructions” what I actually found was simply a picture of the parts and then a picture of the finished product. No steps. What could have been a simple assembly process turned into trial and error, hours of aggravation, and the inevitable discovery at the end that I had some pieces left over whose purpose remains unknown.

• As a leader, is your vision an “IKEA instructions experience” for your team?
• Do people around you seem to spend a lot of time trying to clarify what you see or what they're supposed to achieve next?
• Do you convey a big picture outline sketch of the finished product you see, then direct people back to a list of resources and leave them to “figure it out”?
• Do projects take much longer than you think they should?

Maybe this is an opportunity to ask whether or not you're taking the time to break it down for your team.

Like it or not, most team members need both the vision and the next steps. This is not about micro-managing. And it's not an anti-vision message either. In fact, if you can't show people a vision of what you're trying to build then all the steps in the world may be nothing more than “busy work”… or as the old adage goes, “climbing the ladder, only to find it's leaning against the wrong wall”.

But let's face it – it's faster and more fun to come up with ideas than it is to break those ideas down into a plan that people can actually execute. I've consulted with organisations that clearly had “vision fatigue” – the cumulative effect of endless ideas and initiatives that rarely get executed. Whether it's you, or someone else whose gift is turning ideas into plans, don't underestimate the price we pay for not translating all that possibility into steps our team can actually take.

So if there's an aspect of your vision that seems to have stalled why not take some time this week with a few of your top producers to break it down. Create a plan. Lay out a sequence of steps. Clarify the starting point. Set some milestones. Then see if pictures and plans produce better results than pictures alone.

--------------------
Paul Andrew is Founder of The Leadership Coach™
He is a Keynote Speaker and Management Consultant based in New York

info@theleadershipcoach.com | 1 917 913 4598

There once was an apple farmer who owned a beautiful orchard. The orchard produced many apples, which the farmer used to make apple pies that were thought to be the tastiest around.

Each day, the farmer would pick apples from his orchard and bring them into the building where the pies were made by a crew of bakers. One day the headbaker told the farmer that he needed more apples to keep up with production. The farmer ran out of the building to his apple cart, but instead of pushing the cart in the direction of the orchard to pick apples, he turned to the road and pushed the cart three miles into town, where he paid full-price for apples at the market.

He brought the apples back to his bakers, who were very happy to see that he had returned so quickly with this new material for production. The next day his bakers needed additional apples, and, once again, instead of picking apples from his own orchard, he went into town and bought apples.

One day, the farmer's wife asked him what he was doing. “I'm buying apples for our pies. Look how many I bought today!”

“What about all of the apples on our trees?” she asked.

“Oh, I think I got most of them.”

She grabbed him by the hand and walked him out into the orchard. There, they saw that the branches of his trees were still heavy with apples, many of which were rotting and falling to the ground. They saw a squirrel nibbling on a piece of apple he had found under a tree.

“What you're doing is pretty silly,” said the farmer's wife.

“I gotta go. I need to get into town and buy some apples or we won't be able to keep up with our pie production.” He turned and ran to get his cart so he could get to the market before it closed.

Are you running your business like this farmer? Here are a couple questions to see if you are:

What percentage of your customers are giving you all of the business they could? Yes, of course, iy try to find new customers?


How do you compare?

Are you the farmer? How did you answer the questions I posed above? Are you buying a disproportionate number of new customers, while letting customers you already have “rot on the trees?”

Try this

Forward this newsletter to colleagues in your company. Ask them how much they think your company resembles the farmer. Have a discussion on this topic: What can we do to shift resources from buying apples, at a premium price, to farming our own orchard?

During the start of my career in marketing, I was fortunate enough to work for several years with Ray Kroc, the legendary owner of McDonald's who revolutionized the franchise business through neighborhood marketing. Although Ray imparted enough wisdom to last a lifetime and fill countless volumes of literature, I've distilled his most valuable insights into the following 7 Lessons. Please read them carefully, because if you adopt them as the guiding principles of your own business philosophy, you cannot help but win your competitive battles, no matter how formidable your foes are.

1)It's all local

2)The heart and soul of your business is marketing inside your own walls

3)Community involvement. Become an integral part of your community by being generous with your time and efforts to lend a helping hand to those in your neighborhood who are in need.

4)Trust your people. Allow your employees the freedom to contribute their opinions, insight, and knowledge. Give them the power to make decisions to benefit your customers.

5)A good idea doesn't care where it comes from.

6)To make it work from top to bottom, it has to work from bottom to top.

7)Deliver a powerful level of service – beyond what's expected – and you've created a tangible bond with a customer that no mass media program can achieve.