Achieving unity of purpose.

Achieving unity of purpose across an organization is perhaps the most important reason for CEOs to lead their companies through the strategic planning process. Unity of purpose is required to implement high level manufacturing concepts such as JIT, is necessary to grow a team-based organization and is essential to shortening design schedules and a new product's time-to-market. In fact, unity of purpose is so important to long-term business success that it is the subject of both the first and ninth of W. Edwards Deming's now famous 14 points.

All of us know companies where unity of purpose does not yet exist. In those firms, the sales department is probably at odds with manufacturing; operations might want to speed production to increase output while quality wants to slow the lines down to decrease scrap; purchasing may want to buy at the lowest price, despite what that might do to the engineering staff's ability to control production processes and so on. Add to this the less obvious but equally harmful situation where individuals within a department are reviewed and their salaries adjusted based on performance criteria that conflict with those of other departments.

Worse than departments working against each other is the widespread problem of individual or department-wide definitions of "doing a good job" working against the company's overall business strategy. The fact is, and despite what most CEOs assume, their concept of where the company should be going is generally not known at all, or known only in vague generalities, by those outside his or her office. Worse still, many "strategically blind" employees operate at cross-purpose, cause major inefficiencies, make poor decisions, negate good decisions made by co-workers, and otherwise reduce - day in and day out, in small increments or in large chunks - profitability and the business's ability to succeed.

Unity of purpose is a simple concept to understand, but is difficult to attain. However, it is so important that every CEO should fight to achieve it. Here are some ideas that may help, culled from our experience working with CEOs and CEOs in turnaround situations.

1. Write it down. First and foremost, CEOs need to think through and write down in as much detail as possible the direction he or she is taking the company. Further, such a description must include answers to the inevitable question of "Why that direction?" This written document will then become the company's strategic plan.

Hopefully, such an exercise (or the discussions to follow) will raise red flags if the company's strategic plan is based on obsolete assumptions, inadequate information, or both. This in turn will spur the best managers to conduct new market research and/or a more formal approach to strategic planning.

2. Pass it around. One of the CEO's most important responsibilities is to communicate the contents of the strategic plan, first to the top management team. Better yet, this group of top managers should be intimately involved in creating the plan. The strategic plan - what it is and what it means for each department and individual - should then be presented to all employees, discussed periodically within each department and/or team, and discussed one-on-one between well informed supervisors and each staff member. Finally, a section should be added to each employee's annual performance evaluation to assess how well he or she is internalizing the plan.

3. Walk the talk. Knowing that actions speak louder than words, it is essential that the CEO and the entire top management team reinforce the plan in every action they take and in every decision made. Given this appropriate management behavior, the strategic plan has a fighting chance of filtering throughout the organization. Without it, unity of purpose cannot be achieved.

4. Reward good behavior. The CEO should reward - in as public a setting as possible - those who make decisions that advance the strategic plan, especially if doing so goes against traditional definitions of good performance on an individual or departmental basis. Those who "make it work" despite the barriers erected by the conventional wisdom should be awarded with a cash prize and a piece he or she can display for all to see.

5. Hire and fire wisely. It is a fact of life that some employees will never embrace or internalize a strategic plan that calls for significant change. The CEO must quickly identify these individuals, determine if they educable, and act swiftly to affect a change in attitude and behavior. Further, some individuals should be retired or let go, even if they are adequate employees, simply because they remain a potentially unmovable obstacle to unity.

Similarly, new hires should be brought in based on their qualifications and attitudes relative to implementing the strategic plan, in addition to the traditional criteria that identify a potentially strong performer in a certain department.

Deming has written that "It is management's job to help staff areas work in unison, but this can't be done under the present system. When it comes to a showdown under the present system and someone has to make a decision - forcing him to choose between his own rating or the company's - he will decide for himself. Can you blame him? People work in the system; management creates the system; and the present system must be changed."

Creating unity of purpose is important enough to consider abandoning the present system for a new way of doing business. This is where a credible and comprehensive strategic plan can be a most important and effective management tool.