'It's not just rocket science.' Organisational clarity in an uncertain age

It crossed my mind, not for the first time, how odd it is that some organisations appear to have no vision and only a vaguest idea, while others know exactly what their about?

Talking to C level leaders can be a fascinating and educational experience. They can express the hidden machinations of their sector or industry, the cut and thrust of commerce and extol the potential of a technological advantage with Machiavellian glee.

I once witnessed a CEO at a 'Town Hall' event asked to explain where the proposed changes to her Company were going to take 'us.' She stumbled through some stock responses filled with phrases such as 'better market position', 'improved profitability' , 'commercial advantage.' She actually talked for 11 minutes in response and it was apparent that the person asking the question was no closer to understanding the answer to their original question than they had been 11 minutes earlier.

It wasn't that she was being obtuse or deliberately misleading. It wasn't that she didn't understand the organisation or the markets it operated in. It wasn't that she was a poor speaker.

So why is it that this lack of clarity around the purpose of the organisation seems to be so widespread across multiple sectors and industries?

One of the first things I ask people when I meet them in a work environment is around what they do and how it feeds into the success of their organisation. In most cases people can articulate what they do and what the perceived value of their activity is. What they struggle with is what success for their organisation is. The CEO at that 'Town Hall' was juggling with several definitions of success. She knew what personal success would look like as her rewards were directly linked to it. Her business analysts and shareholder investors were also clear about the measures of success they felt were the priority; market share, perceived valuation, growth and of course profitability. All this leads to a definition of success which is fluid and dependent upon your perspective. Not exactly something to rally around.

Are complexity, or competing views of stakeholders, or market uncertainty reasonable explanations for being unable to create and articulate what an organisation is for? SpaceX, in comparison, are able to be very clear. Cheap, reusable, access to space which will benefit humanity as a whole. The space industry is regarded as extremely high risk, financially complicated, heavily politicised and is actually, 'rocket science', so it's clearly not impossible.

Some might argue that organisations like SpaceX can access the 'big picture' and the romantic narrative of the grand endeavour of humanity reaching out into the unknown? I can see Senior execs folding their arms and countering that it's not so easy to extol the grand vision of cardboard, or groceries, or financial services. That may well be true however if you work for an organisation and cannot sum up what you are all working towards and be able to articulate it concisely and in a way which everyone involved gets then it's time to do something about it.

Don't spend years developing a mission statement, honing your vision and values, tweaking your brand, and coaching your execs in how to field thorny questions around success. Start with the basics and all the rest can follow.

Spend some time answering the exam questions:

Q: What do we do?

Q: Why do we do it?

Q: Who benefits from our effort?

Q: Where are we going as an organisation?

Q: What will make us successful?

Once you and everyone else in your organisation knows the answer to that handful of questions not even the Sky's the limit.

John Hunter

John Hunter is a strategic consultant and Business Transformation and Change specialist.

Veritive Consulting Ltd.