I have recently started an exciting new adventure joining Miramar Executive Search, a Leadership and Talent Advisory firm based in the UK and USA . Working with the team to continue to build a culture of high performance, quality of service and shared responsibility, I thought about a book I read about Organisational Health. This is the belief that the key difference between successful and mediocre companies is how ‘healthy’ they are. For example, is it the kind of environment in which ideas and suggestions are welcomed and listened to; is there a culture in which communication and ideas flow top-down and bottom-up?
The book I refer to is ‘The Advantage’ by Patrick Lencioni. He believes that focusing on organisational health is vitally important for building successful organisations and developed this concept as he sees it representing a virtually untapped competitive advantage within the vast majority of organisations. Lencioni claims that too many leaders are still limiting their search for advantage to conventional areas like marketing, strategy and technology, leaving an untapped opportunity sitting right beneath them. Instead of trying to become smarter, he asserts that organisations need to shift their focus to becoming healthier, allowing them to tap into the collective intelligence and expertise they already have within the team.
Many factors help determine the health of a company and performance is only one of them. Just because your company is performing well does not mean that there are not unhealthy symptoms elsewhere. Lencioni defines a healthy organisation as one with minimal politics and confusion, high degrees of morale and productivity, and low turnover among good people. Organisational health is the best way to predict your future performance. Financial results tell you where you have been, but your health tells you where you are heading. Being healthy as an organisation means you will have the ability to adapt to change and innovate for the future.
The health of an organisation is based on the ability to have a cohesive leadership team that are passionate about the reason the organisation exists and are aligned around vision, strategy, and culture. You must build a team that functions well and trusts each other. Miramar know from the outputs of the recent Leadership Event we hosted with 110 senior executives https://www.miramar.global/news/leadership-forum that a high performing team is more than a group of people who work together. It is a group of people who share a common purpose and who collaborate, challenge and hold each other accountable to achieve outstanding results. Once collectively agreed, the goals and strategies must be communicated repeatedly until the entire organisation is clear on the goals and believes in them.
To build a healthy organisation you must have an engaged culture where every member of the team can be part of a journey they understand and believe in, they have the platform to grow professionally and be inspired to excel in all of their pursuits.
Miramar are passionate about working with business leaders to build high performing leadership teams and collaborative cultures,thus creating the healthiest and most successful organisations. We work with organisations around the world to identify, assess, acquire and develop the most qualified individuals for executive leadership positions. We have experienced executive search specialists in energy, telecoms, media and technology, life sciences and the industrial sectors.
Good luck in your quest in building a healthy organisation that works together to achieve the greatness you strive for!
