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Transformation Planning is directed specifically to improving the overall performance of organizations through their management teams. Naturally, in business, the bottom line is the most important measure of success and the program has delivered this time after time. However, the program also delivers some very specific benefits directly to senior executives and especially to the CEO. We asked our client senior executives what they felt were the benefits they received. The following are among the most frequently quoted.
INSIGHT INTO THE ORGANIZATION
Because of the program's unique diagnostic module, the senior executive can look into every unit of his organization, through the eyes and business judgement of its people, and see, not just the measures of performance as generated by the usual reporting systems, but the culture and motivations (organizational drivers) underlying and governing that performance.
Not all middle managers of course are so confident or altruistic as to want to look this closely into their units. But having done so, they share the same benefits with the senior executive. The ability of managers and supervisors, to identify the drivers of corporate behavior that need changing and then commit to doing so, is one of the key benefits of the program.
The process of course causes the issues to be not just seen and understood but actually dealt with, viscerally. Knowledge is important only if it is understood. Understanding is important only if it is accepted. And acceptance is important only if it is transformed into motivation and action.
ORGANIZATIONAL AGILITY
The most difficult task any manager must undertake is changing his organization. Organizations have immense resistance to change and inertia to continue to do that which has become its pattern. Led by the senior executive, the program dissolves this resistance and reforms the organization around new directions and new vision.
The clearing of organizational blocks which occurs during the process, especially during the first four days, permits the senior executive to shift corporate direction very rapidly when needed. The momentum built up by the rapid implementation of plans provides the steerage-way for this change of direction. And, the on-line action plan, permits the senior executive to direct change where it is needed, to impel change where that is necessary and to control its pace, with considerable ease.
MANAGEMENT TEAMS
As a by-product of undertaking the program, the managers of the organization weld themselves quite naturally into a proactive management team that is centered on the senior executive who leads the program. As subordinate unitsundergo the program, their managers and supervisors also form themselves into teams centered on their leaders.
INTRODUCTION OF NEW MANAGERS
The program is particularly powerful in bringing on new managers. It gives them a platform from which to commit to the their boss. It enables them to really get on the team, to see quickly the business vision for the company, in detail, and contribute to it and embrace it. The program also enables their subordinates to imprint on them, form a team with them and make common commitment with them to the future of the company.
SALES AND ENTREPRENEURSHIP
The program owes its origins in part to our work in not-for-profit companies where sales, marketing and entrepreneurial orientations have been lacking and needed. In the depository industry, having all staff understand, emotionally, the company's need for sales and customer relationships is of great importance. Having them commit personally to actually selling is even more important. Efficiency, as a major instrument of entrepreneurship, is also given prominent play.
Executives who want to can use the program to enhance or introduce these orientations in their staffs.
EMPOWERMENT
The process gives the senior executive the vehicle for empowering his people, for publicly ordaining them, before their peers and subordinates, with the authority to do and achieve. Each manager and supervisor becomes empowered to become the ceo of their section, taking responsibility and accountability for its success. They can also learn how to do the same for their people.
Interestingly, it also gives middle managers the mechanism to support, encourage and empower the senior executive. By the time the program for the senior team is done, management's power to effect the future of the organization has grown very significantly.
COMMITMENT OF MANAGERS
The program gives managers, especially middle managers and supervisors who are the true implementers of all change, a safe place in which to commit to the future of the organization, not just intellectually but emotionally; a very difficult thing to do in the ordinary course of business. These commitments are made to the senior executive who leads the process, and are witnessed by their peers, and most importantly, their subordinates. In the final analysis, the achievements that are triggered by the program are driven by this commitment.
BUSINESS CREATIVITY AND INNOVATION
Using the techniques and the technology of the program, the senior executive can tap into the creativity of his managers. They in turn will be able to engage the creative talents of their people.
MANAGEMENT DEVELOPMENT
During the program, middle managers and supervisors witness scores, sometimes hundreds, of business decisions being made in full context of the financials, the economy, the competition, the membership, politics and the profusion of other factors that effect the operation of a company. Of particular importance to them is witnessing the senior executive's decisions. In the space of a few days they are exposed to as much as might take them as many years of ordinary work. To paraphrase Drucker, no better way of developing managers can be found than having them actively participate in, and witness the process of, management.
LEADERSHIP
Of all the benefits that our clients have reported, the satisfaction, perhaps even the joy, of leading a winning team is probably ranked the most important.
On to Planner Benefits
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