If you want to ensure that your organisation is delivering great products, services, and customer experiences then ensure that you are constantly adding value to everything that you do.
This is an extremely powerful lesson that I learned from Jonathan Rasmusson’s book The Agile Samurai, and it is something that I firmly believe that everyone can and should apply to their businesses and careers.
When I led HR for Starbucks , my team and I would pretend that we were the internal customer, and that we were spending our own money to hire a top notch team to deliver the project.
We started off by asking ourselves : (1) What would give us confidence that the team we hired was actually delivering? (2) A pile of documentation, plans, and reports? (3) Or the regular delivery of working, efficient , productive processes and systems that ensure that the company operated optimally.
When you start looking at product delivery, project delivery, or whatever from your customer’s point of view, good things start to happen.
1. Start by breaking big problems down into smaller ones.
A week is a relatively short period of time. You can’t possibly do everything in a week! To get anything done, you have to break big, scary problems down into smaller, simpler, more manageable ones.
2. Only Focus on the really important stuff and forget everything else.
Most of what we traditionally deliver on projects is of little or no value to our customer.
This is even more apt when it comes to the work produced by most HR departments.
Sure, you need documentation. Sure, you need plans. But they are in support of only one thing—a satisfied customer, or a efficient and productive organisation.
By delivering something of value every week, you are forced to get lean and drop anything that doesn’t add value. As a result, you travel lighter and take only what you need.
3. Ensure that what you are delivering works.
Delivering something of value every week implies that what you deliver had better work.
If you are delivering a product to the customer, ensure that it works, or that it is not damaged, or that the process or systems you are implementing are not adding bottlenecks to the way the organisation is running.
That means quality control or testing—lots of it, early and often.
The buck needs to stop with you and your team.
4. Be constantly looking for feedback.
I get it, business operates at a blindingly fast speed. We are always under pressure to complete projects, deliver products and satisfy clients.
There is no time to stop and deliberate.
The thing is, how do you know if you are actually hitting the bulls-eye if you don’t regularly stop and ask your customer if you’re aiming at the right target?
When you are barreling down the highway at 100 miles per hour, then feedback is the headlight that cuts through the fog, and keeps you on the road.
Without a constant feedback mechanism , your customer loses the ability to steer—and you end up in the ditch.
5. Change course when necessary.
This is something that I see all of the time.
Stuff happens on projects. Life happens. Things change. People leave, and new people join the organisation. What was really important one week can be descoped the next. If you create a plan and follow it blindly, you won’t be able to roll with the punches when they come. That’s why when reality messes with your plan, you change your plan—not reality.
6. Become accountable.
When you commit to delivering something of value every week and showing your customer how you’ve spent their money, you become accountable.
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That means you ultimately own the quality of the work, the product or the service.
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That means you ultimately own the schedule. If you dont meet the deadline, you are responsible. Don’t shift the blame.
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That means setting expectations.
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That means spending the money as if it were your own.
Do i really believe that everyone (especially my entire HR team) was going to work this way?
No way – and for the same reason that most people eat unhealthily and don’t exercise, even though they know they should.
It is uncomfortable and not for the faint of heart.
When you make a commitment to deliver something of value every week, you are putting the spotlight on yourself and your team, like never before.
For us as a HR team, there was no place to hide. Either we produced something of value or we did not.
The same goes for your business. When you commit to producing quality work, and great customer experiences, you are making yourself vulnerable.
Customers are now expecting quality work, and great experiences. And either you and your organisation can produce value, or you cant.
But if you like the visibility, have a passion for quality, and have a fierce desire to execute, working like this can be personally very rewarding and a heck of a lot of fun.
And in case the one-week thing is stressing you out, don’t worry about it—it’s irrelevant. Start by delivering something of value every two weeks (or even every three if you have a very big project/team).
It’s just a metaphor to get you thinking about regularly putting quality products, services, whatever in front of your customer, getting some feedback, and changing course when necessary. That’s it.