Unifying the Organization

A well communicated strategy sends the message: "We're all in this together."

A clear strategy acts as a unifying force within an organization. You may have worked in organizations where the staff focus only on their job and don't understand how it fits into wider processes and objectives (and perhaps don't even care). This results in confusion, frustration for staff and customers alike, and ultimately a short-term future for the organization.

By creating a clear strategy and sharing it with your team or organization, everyone knows where they are going: people are then far more likely to adjust their behavior to make the whole enterprise work better. A well communicated strategy sends the message: "We're all in this together." Having a destination is very powerful in terms of human motivation because we are motivated in one of two ways: "away from pain" or "toward pleasure." The former leads to behavior that achieves a short-term result, but having moved away from pain we may end up in a place we are not so keen to be. If we move toward pleasure we will be more likely to achieve a goal that we want to sustain.

ACTION POINT: Move away from pain toward pleasure.