From the Desk of Paul:
At ITG, the bulk of our business revolves around solving problems for other companies; however, sometimes we have had the tendency to become so focused on solving the problems of other companies that we fail to see our own weaknesses and therefore fail to really dig in and work on resolving them. Multitudes of studies show that managing organizational health of any business is just as important as managing the P&L, yet most companies neglect managing organizational health while managing the P&L to the fullest. Why is this? Perhaps managing organizational health seems vaguer and more complicated than managing the P&L, thus organizational health is often neglected.
Several years ago ITG adopted an “operating system” or a business framework, that really forced us to work diligently on Organizational Health. I would personally describe Organizational Health as a company’s ability to engage as many of its resources as possible to move in a singular direction and gain momentum along that continuum. It may help to think about what that looks like to better understand the concept. Companies with good Organizational Health utilize all, or as many as possible, of their resources, especially human resources, to move the organization towards successfully accomplishing its objectives. (Objectives may include growth, profitability, market leadership, social contributions, etc.) Recognizable characteristics of such good organizational health may include employee alignment with the organization’s purpose or mission, employee engagement to the point that the individual’s desires become secondary to the betterment of the organization and a high-level of accountability in all directions for operational excellence.
As leaders, if we expect for our employees to be aligned with the organization’s purpose or mission, then that purpose or mission must first be well-defined. Upon doing that, there must be a strong commitment from leadership, to hire, evaluate, promote and terminate with consideration of such alignment at the forefront of all thoughts related to personnel. This process is the most effective way to create and maintain the sought-after culture of alignment that will lead to success. Employees must be able to not only agree with the purpose or mission but also be so passionate about it that they are willing to engage in the pursuit of it on a daily basis. Such passion will allow employees to take more ownership of outcomes when it comes to execution because they can easily put the well-being of the organization ahead of their own personal desires.
Core values in healthy organizations are often foundational to the level of multi-directional accountability required to achieve and maintain excellence in the organization’s pursuit of its mission or purpose. It is important to remember that core values are not necessarily learned as much as they are identified. If an employee does not share the same core values as the organization, almost no amount of teaching will be effective in the alignment between the employee and the organization. Some level of alignment must already exist and be improved upon to move forward. In a situation where there is no alignment at all, it would be better for the organization and employee to simply part ways.
When such employee alignment and engagement exist and can be built upon, the required accountability for excellence becomes less of a challenge. The organization is well-positioned to accomplish its purpose and mission. Success in other areas often follows as a result of good Organizational Health.
As always, if you have questions or comments that you would like for me to address, please contact me at pmeadows@itgroupva.com.
President/CEO
