It is interesting to note how often something does NOT work, is ineffective, or doesn’t provide the experience we all want to provide to our customers. When the person doing it says “Jim told me to do that”, or “that is what I was told to do”, or “that is the way we have always done it”, what they are really saying is that they are not willing to strive towards something better.

This is a frustrating situation because these people are putting the responsibility on someone or something else when they are ultimately responsible.  In many cases, you are still left with a result that does no one any good.  Other times, we give someone a task, and they come back to us to report that the task is complete.  Later on we find they failed half a dozen different ways, but eventually got it to work right.  They did not stop until they got a result.  Regardless of “how” it was done, they obtained the right results.  They got the results without complaining and learned much along the way.

Typically, there are two types of people working in organizations: those that want to focus on “how” and “blame” and “what does not work” and those that focus on and get the “result” without wasting time and energy on what is unimportant (in fact, most of them learn from the intermediate “failures”).  In order to survive and succeed, we must weed out the former and find ways to attract and retain the latter.  We need to pay for results, not hard working attempts that do not get results (even though most of those hardworking attempts come from very well-meaning people).

• Does your organization focus on results or excuses?

• How do you celebrate the “failures” that lead to wisdom, and ultimately, success?

• Do you accept the status quo, or do you challenge your employees to greater achievement?

If your organization needs help creating and refining its processes to support your long-term vision, contact our expert guides by calling 800-786-4332, or email JSabatini@AppliedVisionWorks.com.  Success is in plain sight and only takes 30 minutes to get started!