Business leaders are used to defining measures for success. Doing so at the beginning of a venture is best. Yet a great success definition falls short of illuminating the spectrum of outcomes leaders must consider.
In fact, it’s every bit as helpful to define what mediocrity and failure might look like. That way, you know the positive – and negative – boundaries of any venture.
As an executive coach, I work often with CEO clients. I’ve found that their effectiveness depends on their discernment. Do they really know if their enterprise or project is up, down, or sideways? Many don’t, because while they often set benchmarks for success, they rarely ask the right questions to establish what up, down AND sideways might look like.
I recently worked with a CEO who had added a new service. She admitted it was facing stiff competition, and the outcomes were far from assured. Although the service was launched 18 months before our first conversation about it and the results were unremarkable, she continued to be optimistic, saying that it “should be a success.” I asked a series of questions designed to help her develop specific, measurable endpoints for success, failure, and mediocrity. She was taken aback by the questions around failure and mediocrity, yet, by the end of several discussions, she realized that the service line was indeed already at a failure endpoint.
It was time to cut her losses, which she did. She told me later that if she hadn’t been asked those questions, she’d still be holding out hope for a victory celebration.
Leaders who set and stick with clear standards for win, lose, or draw are more likely to use resources wisely.
When defining outcomes, I ask my clients many questions to help them be as specific as possible. I believe they know the answers, but it’s helpful because no one’s asking them to brainstorm about mediocrity and failure. What measurements will give us the clearest picture of performance? How will we know if we are headed in the direction of failure? Under what conditions might we defy dismal marks and press on? And so on.
I respectfully challenge leaders to ask itself tough questions about measurable outcomes up front – win, lose, and draw – and, for extra credit, to do that in all future ventures before one dollar ever hits the P & L.
Finally, if you’re wondering about other real-world applications of these ideas, check out my OpEd piece along the same lines about American efforts in Afghanistan, coming out this Friday in the Christian Science Monitor.
David Peck, Executive Coach and President