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Leadership Today
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Reflections from Good to Great and Beyond Great, part 5 
Last time we talked about man's "search for significance." We continue in that vein today.
Some societies and cultures encourage people to pursue tangible/physical dreams. In the United States there are expressions such as “living the American dream.” This phrase boasts that people can dream of accomplishing things for themselves and their family, and in the USA there is the freedom to work hard to accomplish it. It is a powerful motivator. Sometimes people flee from one country to another simply to have that kind of freedom and opportunity.
These types of accomplishments alone though, even with their powerful motivation, come up short in terms of eternal significance. Chuck Swindoll, Pastor of Stonebriar Community Church in Frisco, Texas, recently spoke about the spiral of pursuit that can trap us in earthly dreams.
He warned:
“We work hard.
We earn more.
We spend more.
We climb higher.
We work harder.
We earn even more.
We spend still more.”
And the cycle repeats. It can leave us simply exhausted, and at the same time frustrated with the lack of meaning and significance—“chasing after the wind.”
A Dallas business man, Bob Buford, illustrates that some people, after accomplishing “greatness” in business, fight to find a fulfillment in the second half of their lives. He authored a book called Halftime[1] that focuses on this.
He personally decided to leave his position as CEO and owner of a highly successful television cable service company so that he could pursue “meaning” on another path. Bob founded and now leads “The Buford Foundation and Leadership Network.” They support churches with leadership resources. The Christian Management Association awarded Mr. Buford its most prestigious award in 2005 to recognize the accomplishments of his “second half.”
Buford has now written another book that tells the stories of some 60 professionals who have accomplished significant things in their second career-life. That book is called Finishing Well[2]. The point is that no matter the riches and earthly accomplishments, some professionals are now making dramatic, life changing transformations in their careers and lives in order to find and pursue something of significance.
Some of us are moved in a direction of transformation due to "pain." Next time we will consider that circumstance.
Many thanks,
Larry Meeker
President, Advanced Team Concepts
[1] Bob Buford, Halftime: Changing your Game Plan from Success to Significance (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1994).
[2] Bob Buford, Finishing Well: What People Who Really Live Do Differently? (Nashville: Integrity Publishers, 2004).
| Reflections from Good to Great and Beyond Great, part 4 
Every human being needs meaning in his or her life—something of importance, something that has direction and purpose. At times, for people in leadership roles, it can be a very conscious longing. It can even be painful—to realize that despite lots of hard work, we have not accomplished anything of eternal significance. We are tired from our labor and yet struggle to find meaning in all that we have done.
A classic book addressing the importance of purpose to humans is Man’s Search for Meaning by Dr. Victor E. Frankl.[1] His knowledge on this subject is grounded in his personal story. You see, he was a survivor of the concentration camp, Auschwitz, during World War II.
Dr. Frankl was a psychiatrist. He had enjoyed a good practice; he and his family lived the good life. During World War II he was rounded up with millions of others and taken to a “hell on earth.” His book and his later theories in the field of psychiatry are based on what he experienced and learned in those circumstances that were more horrific than most of us can even imagine.
In his book, Frankl shares stories that relay how important meaning was to those who were not executed, but instead put to work. “Meaning” in their lives turned out to be essential, even to survive. It sustained them. They leaned toward it as a way to pass through the helplessness and pain of the present.
Having something significant yet to do can be an essential driver in our lives. I encourage you to ponder this deeply. Try to imagine how your business might be a vehicle for you to accomplish things on a higher level.
Next time we will consider a few thoughts by Charles Swindoll and Bob Buford on this topic.
Many thanks for following the discussion,
Larry Meeker
President, Advanced Team Concepts
[1] Viktor E Frankl, Man’s Search for Meaning (Washington: First Washington Square Press, 1985).
| Reflections from Good to Great and Beyond Great, part 3 
Beyond Great
Much has been written about how to achieve business success—volumes of literature and theories. Walk into any large bookstore, enter the section on “management and business” and you can be overwhelmed with the assortment of books to choose from. Log into your favorite search engine. Key in “leadership.” You will get a return of hundreds of millions of articles, companies, websites and resources.
Much of this information suggests strategies for success. Unfortunately, much of it comes up short in explaining the underlying foundational principles that make the observations true or possible. The findings are interesting, and the instructions are often helpful. To reach great and go beyond, we will need to understand the critical foundational principles and then build on them.
“Good” levels of company performance, or maybe even “great” levels, might be obtainable by simply applying principles—in other words, by trying to conform to the models or techniques of others.
With Beyond Great we will be looking for a radical result. Rather than conforming, it will require transformation. One must embrace the principles and live them, not just apply them.
Transformation then, is the unifying essence of stretching Beyond Great.
The essence of Beyond Great—to fulfill more than just financial success; to have success that in addition satisfies and fulfills the spirit, of ourselves and of all those we include in the enterprises that we lead.
At this point, we hope you find this to be very thought provoking. To go Beyond Great, company leaders must put their eyes on the eternal horizon. Christian leaders seem best suited to do this. They are familiar with important eternal lessons God provides in order to stretch us in supremely important areas of success.
In some respects, Beyond Great is a “wakeup call” to organizational leaders. The status quo may be far short of the potential eternal impact of the company.
Warm regards,
Larry Meeker
President, Advanced Team Concepts
| Reflections from Good to Great and Beyond Great, part 2 
Definitions for Success
When the Good to Great team had identified their set of “great” companies via a rigid set of diagnostics, they dug in to find key differentiators that propelled companies ahead of their competition—similar organizations in the same industries. Several key areas emerged as truly important. Collins and his team homed in on those that seemed to be common threads among the great performers. Their book illuminates the findings in areas such as:
- Leadership
- Team composition
- Capacity to confront facts, even “brutal” facts
- Adhering to a central focus—a Hedgehog Concept
- Wisely using technology accelerators
The companies featured as “great” in Collins’ book could be the envy of many business leaders. They set the stage for us to ask key questions:
- What is a “good” company?
- What is great in the context of a company?
- Why desire to strive “Beyond Great”?
- What exactly do we mean by “Beyond Great”?
We will keep the definitions of these concepts straightforward.
Good—this is okay performance.
Truthfully, for some companies in recent years, goodness has simply been the capacity to survive in very difficult times. In the most simple of definitions, we would say that a “good” company is profitable, and, if not growing, certainly stable.
Great—this involves significantly better financial performance than a good company.
For companies to make the cut in Collins’ book, financial performance had to be head and shoulders above their competitors. Collins laid out the performance of the “comparison” companies side-by-side with the performance of the great corporations.
Beyond Great—this would have to take a company to some still higher reach.
To do that, we have to consider more than money. It cannot be as simple as financial success. What we want to do is add an eternal implication—economic success coupled to enduring impact.
Beyond Great organizations achieve impact that exceeds the “bottom line” – i.e. the companies succeed, but also the people of the enterprise, their families, the community and God’s world benefit from their work and success.
Thank you for your interest. We will continue the discussion next time.
Larry Meeker
President, Advanced Team Concepts
| Reflections from Good to Great and Beyond Great, part 1 
Striving for Success
Every owner and stockholder wants his or her company to succeed, right? We want to work in a good company. Most of us would like it to be a greatcompany if possible. Who would not?
Business leaders, the CEO’s and executives, all want to see their companies rise in stature and success. This may be rooted in a range of motivations. It can vary from:
A personal connection between performance and compensation—the more successful the company, the higher the executive pay.
to:
A passion for the mission of the company.
Success rests to a large extent on financial performance, especially in the “for-profit” world. It may have different measures and elements of emphasis, but the bottom line is important.
Non-profit organizations may look more to mission specific measures, but even they must pay attention to the financials if they are to remain in business.
In addition to the “bottom-line,” groups measure quality, customer satisfaction, market share, employee satisfaction and many other metrics. Tools such as balance scorecards are sometimes used to provide a well rounded accounting of how the company is really doing. Even so, none of this attention seems to dilute emphasis on financial profit and growth.
Jim Collins and his research team have done some interesting analysis of “great” organizations. The resulting book by Collins’ and team is Good to Great. It highlights important characteristics essential for a company to become truly great. Their research is based on actual financial performance and sustained success, objective measures that CEO’s relate to. The book is very popular. The data cannot be easily dismissed, nor would we want to. In our discussion, we want to learn from it…and more.
We will look at some of the basis of that analysis next time. We will also examine reflections from this author's book, Beyond Great. From the two books we will be able to pull some key lessons and principles.
Thanks,
Larry Meeker
President, Advanced Team Concepts
| Diversity , Understanding Differences 
For my third entry on diversity, I want to address the importance of understanding differences in the workplace. Individual personalities are complex and certainly diverse, and these differences can have a tremendous impact within an organization. I’m talking specifically about behavior and communication styles.
Think about how these differences impact our actions. They affect the way we view and act in relationships, the way we learn, the way we communicate. They even influence our choice of career.
Within the workplace, our differences can impact:
- Communicating
- Problem solving and decision making
- Handling conflict
- Planning and setting goals
- Managing and/or implementing change
- Dealing with stress
- Building a team
- Leading a team
The list goes on. Each of these elements can be impacted positively or negatively, depending on our level of awareness concerning the differences and how we deal with them. For example, an organization could be crippled by an inability to effectively handle conflict. But the same organization, with a process in place for managing conflict and reaching consensus, could use the same diversity to come up with a huge range of ideas, plans or solutions.
When dealing with differences in the workplace:
- Show a genuine interest in others- ask them questions and learn about their preferences
- Respect other’s rights to be different - you can respect without agreeing
- Reserve judgment – make sure you don’t stereotype
- Don’t be intimidated by or afraid of differences
Many of us have participated in “personality” or “behavioral” assessments in the workplace. In fact, ATC regularly uses these assessments with our customers. These tools, when properly administered, can be valuable in helping identify the behavioral preferences or styles that make up a work team. Additionally, when teams invest in learning more about behavioral diversity, they can better interact with coworkers, partners and customers.
Imagine your team as a jigsaw puzzle. Some team members are curved, some jagged, some turned inward, some outward. Each brings different qualities and different contributions. Ideally, each are working to fit in and working toward the team’s goals. What a great analogy for the power of diversity! We’re all different, but we’re all needed to complete the picture.
Many thanks for your interest,
Angela Gallogly, ATC Vice President of USA Operations
| Cultural Diversity 
In this second entry on diversity, I’ll introduce the topic of culture and cultural differences. To get started, I researched some “official” definitions for the term culture. Dictionary.com had a dozen different definitions. Here are the two that best fit our topic of diversity:
-The sum total of ways of living built up by a group of human beings and transmitted from one generation to another.
And
-The behaviors and beliefs characteristic of a particular social, ethnic, or age group.
This really amounts to a set of collectively held values. Many of us think first of race or nationality when we consider the term culture. And since many organizations operate on a global scale, cultural diversity in the workplace is frequent. Individuals from different parts of the world can have different approaches to doing business. Examples include:
- Time Management
- Communication Styles
- Perspective on Results
- Business Relationships
- Power and Authority
- Handling Conflict
This is only a partial list. You can imagine the potential differences that can arise from these examples alone. There can be breakdowns or misunderstandings in each of these areas and many others. One person’s “way of doing business” can be very strange or even offensive to individuals with different cultural backgrounds.
This dynamic applies to most of us. We work for a global organization, exist in a diverse workplace, or have customers or even competitors from around the world. If any of these apply, it can be important to spend some time focusing on cultural diversity.
There is challenge as we work through our cultural differences, but there is also the opportunity for a widened business perspective that can benefit the individuals and their organization. As I mentioned in my last blog – we should strive to leverage our diversity rather than allowing it to limit us in our work.
There are many models, books and articles that can provide insight into cultural diversity. Awareness of potential differences can prepare us for actions in others that might differ from our own behavior. This can be a valuable starting point, but it’s important to remember that no model should be considered in absolutes. It would be a critical mistake to generalize based on race or country. Everyone should be considered an individual.
Remember these important points:
- There are no right or wrong, good or bad in cultural differences. Try to see differences as a possibility rather than a problem because “they aren’t doing it my way.”
- Learning about cultural differences is not about trying to be like the other person/people. The richness in multi-cultural teams comes from the differences. Embrace the differences.
- Whatever you know about cultural differences, it won’t all apply, or even apply in the same way to everybody.
- However much you think you know, you will always get some things wrong. The key is to show genuine interest in learning. Be empathetic, respectful and interested.
More to come next time.
Thanks for your continuing interest,
Angela Gallogly, ATC Vice President of USA Operations
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