Closing the Gaps

I was fortunate to attend the Accerlerent event this morning as a guest of a good friend and client, Don Jalbert, owner of Exhibit Associates. The speaker was Hyrum Smith, co-founder and former CEO of FranklinCovey. Hyrum shared a number of valuable pearls of wisdom that he further explains in his new book, The 3 Gaps. The keystone concept as presented by Hyrum Smith is to identify and close "gaps" in 3 essential areas: 

1) Belief - Is there a gap in what I believe in and what I do?

2) Time - Is there a gap between what I did today and what I planned to do?

3) Value - Is there a gap between what I value most and how I am living?  

A state of "inner peace" is found through closing any gaps in these areas. Inner peace could be translated to a highly efficient organization.

Hyrum goes on to explain his process by using the concept of Value as an example and drilling deeper. There are 3 steps to the process:

Step 1- Identify governing values

• What are the highest priorities in my life?
• What would I "cross a 300 ft long I-Beam 10 stories high for"?
• What would I risk everything for or devote my life to?

Step 2 - Write a clarifying statement about each.
Step 3 - Prioritize the values.

Hyrum calls the results from the exercise above a "personal constitution" - comparing the concept to the Constitution of the United States - a document that sets out the guiding principles from which decisions, laws, actions should be governed or measured by.   

One of Hyrum's closing comments was "happiness is the root cause of improvement". I am not sure I would agree 100% with that comment, but I have seen how "happiness" (demonstrated by companies that have closed most gaps...or have a process in place to work toward closing gaps) are more efficient, healthy, and profitable.

Hyrum reminds us that the basic principles that help people become more efficient have not changed since the beginning of time. These proven concepts should be modeled by leaders and applied consistently to maximize the value of the enterprise.

It can be challenging to think through and develop our own personal constitution, but becoming aware of gaps and working to close them is a path toward success...on both a personal and professional level.