Michael Mendes: Creating Greater Cultural and Strategic Alignment

It was Jack Welch – former CEO and Chairman of General Electric who said, "No company, small or large, can win over the long run without energized employees who believe in the mission and understand how to achieve it." In order to achieve this winning culture, an organization needs develop a coherent plan which is embraced by the key employee stakeholders, and is effectively communicated so that employees understand their role in helping achieve the core objectives.

To create and manage a successful business a leader must not only develop a sound strategy, but more importantly enable effective implementation at a tactical level to make achieving the strategy possible. As Managing Partner and CEO of Just Desserts, I have learned that both leaders and the employees who support them will generate optimal results in a culture that promotes collaboration, communication, and is results oriented. It is crucial that a leader realizes their critical role in helping motivate their team, and building a culture that helps make this possible. As Sam Walton said, 'Outstanding leaders go out of their way to boost the self-esteem of their personnel. If people believe in themselves, it's amazing what they can accomplish.'
The numbers tell the same story. In 2019, ILS Recruitment in the UK published The Retention Report. In it, Executive Director of Coalition for a Digital Economy (Coadec) Dom Hallas reported a finding that "80% of candidates considered leaving their role due to poor working culture or management style," with the same percentage believing that "their manager has a significant impact on their level of happiness." The issue of retention can be directly linked to the management team and ultimately the company CEO.

Developing a distinct culture and enabling team members to better understand and embrace the organizations overall strategy can be key to a company's success:

Building a Distinct Culture is Key to Enable Achieving the Desired Results of the Organization
Employees ultimately want to understand what "winning" at a corporate level means, but more importantly, what it means for their day to day objective and the manner in which they deport themselves in the workplace. Often leaders spend a disproportionate amount of time developing a plan, but fail to provide the nuance related to the desired cultural norms of the organization. While focus on outcomes are critical, the sharing of optimal behavioral constructs will dictate largely the manner in which the organization approaches obtaining objectives. As individuals come from diverse backgrounds, they bring a distinct view of how they communicate, manage risk and collaborate. Not any one culture is ideal, but developing a shared view on cultural norms that are particularly well suited to the nature of the business can be critical. Some organization encourage collaboration, while others may create a culture of internal "competition" to drive results. Some organizational cultural have a distinct view on time, organization and reliability, while other may embrace a more informal approach, emphasizing flexibility and creativity.

While there is not a prescribed approach best suited for all businesses, successful leaders are purposeful in communicating effectively the desired constructs which best describes "how" the company work and interacts. Embracing a coherent approach on the desired behavioral attributes employee exhibit as they work and interact will have a direct impact on results.

Establishing Greater Alignment with Employees and the Corporate Strategy
Employees are one of the most critical resources in any company. If this resource is not effectively motivated, productivity will most likely be substantially compromised. How can this be achieved? One way is to align employee objectives with the firm's target. This is a very under-utilized goalpost according to Robert S. Kaplan and David P. Norton who found that "a mere 7% of employees today fully understand their company's business strategies and what's expected of them in order to help achieve company goals." Further, in a study conducted by Robert S. Huckman and Bradley Staats in the Harvard Business Review, it was found that "when familiarity with the organizations strategy increased by 50%, defects decreased by 19%, and deviations from budget decreased by 30%.

Developing a "bottom up" approach to strategic planning can create greater alignment as employees can be involved at the ground level in the Strategic Planning process. While this inclusive approach can take more time than a more prescriptive "top down" approach, in can provide valuable input, and a much deeper sense of ownership in the ultimate plan.