Leadership Skills
The Timely Leader
By Brian Ward
Apr 14, 2007 - 10:57:43 AM

Deliver better value...faster! In this, the fifth and last in the series on Facet Leadership, we explore the part that time plays in executing your leadership focus.

Okay, we’re in the final straight.

You’ve decided on your focus.

You’ve started your journey towards greater self awareness.

You’ve gathered and demonstrated the courage to challenge people’s view of reality.

You’ve begun the task of listening to lots of other people about how the focus can be achieved.

Now comes the toughest part of all - setting deadlines.

Now we will get down to discussing timing.

Getting the timing right on key decisions and actions s what will make or break any strategy. Introduce an nnovation too quickly or too hastily, and the rewards can go to a competitor who learns from your mistakes and moves at the requisite speed to introduce an alternative product or service, probably not even as good technically as what you have to offer.

Proponents of time based innovation or competition, such as George Stalk, Jr. of the Boston Consulting Group, are keen to emphasize that it is the relative speed that counts.

Time based leadership is all about being faster at providing value…in short, “better value, faster.”

But many leaders and their organizations have struggled with this. Instead of creating nimble, smooth flowing organizations, they have created organizations that always seem to be on a treadmill that keeps running faster and faster, without any noticeable payoffs.

I believe that part of the reason for this is the inability of organizations to learn quickly from their experiences…in short, their inability to become a true learning organization.

As you engage your organization on its journey…it will become more focused, more authentic, more courageous (especially at bottom line innovation), and more willing to listen empathically, to each other, to customers, to suppliers.

That last point is one that is at the core of being a learning organization.

But many organizations mistook the concept of a ‘learning organization’ as meaning more consensus building, more dialogue, more debate…and less closure.

For many, creating a ‘learning organization’ became the central focus.  Conferences, workshops, seminars, consultants, executive retreats, books, etc grew out of a genuine interest in what is a sound concept…and a whole new industry emerged.

Then organizations lost their focus.

As mission critical decisions needed to be made and executed with relative speed, these organizations languished in a sea of dialogue, debate, introspection and at times false consensus.

The ‘learning organization’ movement was in trouble.

The central tenet of a learning organization is that no learning can occur without action, reflection and reaction, in a repeating cycle that takes into account unanticipated outcomes. These cycles occur within predictable timeframes. Few organizations truly mastered the ability to use time as a framework to measure and manage their learning. When I ask the question “What’s the deadline on this?” in organizations that are caught in this trap, the response I often get is “Oh, it’s ongoing”.

I then advise the leaders that they have to rid their leadership vocabulary of the word ‘ongoing’.

Understand that as a leader you need to know and appreciate the value of identifying mission critical processes and their time cycles.

These processes cover product/service development, testing, prototyping, implementing, marketing, selling, producing, delivering, follow-up, evaluation and the many support processes involved in making your organization the best place to do business with and to work in.

You have to know when to let a process run and when to intervene. You have to emphasize the need to engage everyone fully in process simplification in order to shorten these cycle times, which will result in lower costs and improved quality, better speed to market, more responsiveness, as well as greater satisfaction for everyone – customers, suppliers, and employees.

This is how to deliver ‘better value, faster.’