My friend L started at a family-owned multi-national company last year after a long career in much larger public companies. When she told me about this change, I was not sure if she was going to like it but she had a good feeling about it. The first few months were bumpy - she said she was struggling to find her bearings and understand where she fit in the organization. We chatted for a couple of hours last weekend and things are way different now and in a positive way.
L's new company has a way setting team goals that she had never encountered in the past. The CEO and his small leadership team comes up with the goals for the year and they ask all parts of the organization what part of those goals they would like to own and deliver on. There are no set expectations - teams are meant to look at who they have on board, what they are good at and what they can reasonably take on to achieve some part of the goal.
Based on what they signed up to do as a team, individuals are then assigned their specific smaller goals against which their performance will be measured. Then there remains hairy things no one is crazy about taking on - that is where aspiring leaders can make their mark. They are free to sign up and pull a like-minded team together to close the gaps.
But this process does not happen until all teams have had a chance to deliberate what they want to own. The leftovers are not fun to work with but it they also present opportunity to those who choose to sign up. L's team is one of those what are very good at what they do and take on a respectable chunk of deliverables against the CEO level goals. But it is not the team that goes above and beyond - people want to do a good job working reasonable hours and having capacity to live the rest of their lives relatively stress free.
All teams are not like hers and that is culturally completely acceptable. People from teams like L's have the choice to be part of some cleanup crew that is going to be doing some hard but useful work no regular team wants to sign up for.
This freedom of choice is what had L quite confused in her first few months but she sees it as the source of strength for this company that has been around a very long team and has always been a great place to work. She sees why. I wish more companies could emulate this model and create an environment that rewards all types of work and workstyles as long as people are objectively contributing to the goals the company is pursuing.
Much credit goes to clarity of leadership vision that can be distilled down to individual goals down to the last person in the company. It is quite remarkable as it is an exception from what I have seen over the years.
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