Discipline makes Daring possible.

Musings from The Disappearing Boss on People, Process and Responsible Autonomy for small-business employers.

Category: Responsible Autonomy

Exit
April 5, 2019

Exit

Investors and business angels have a clear exit strategy – grow fast for 3-5 years, sell up and crystallise the gains. Happily, this strategy often coincides with that of the entrepreneur, who wants to get this business idea going, and then move on to the next.

Most small business owners don’t have an exit strategy, or certainly don’t start with one.

Thinking about exit often only happens when some event reminds us of our mortality. If that doesn’t happen, the business simply winds down to nothing alongside its owner.

Partly this is due to our natural tendency to think short-term; partly because we simply can’t imagine ourselves without our business, and partly because we don’t believe our business could survive without us.

Perhaps then, rather than focus on our own exit, we could focus instead on the future life of our business as we would focus on the future life of our child – with the aim of making it independent?

If a business was a child, we would nurture it through the early years, then start giving it more responsibility and autonomy, so that when the time is right, the child leaves us, ready, willing and able to make its own dent in the universe.

This doesn’t mean you exit your business with nothing, it just changes who you might sell it to.

Who better than the people who helped you raise it?

Perspective
April 4, 2019

Perspective

I’ve been having a problem with “employee engagement” for a while now. It’s a similar problem to the one I have with “customer experience”.

I’ve been thinking about why this is is, and I’ve realised that its because both these phrases speak from the same perspective. They’re really about ‘me the employer’ or ‘me the seller’. Actually, they are most often used by corporates, so are often really about ‘me the shareholder’.

As a result they feel (to me at least), manipulative, even extractive. They are about what I can get from you the employee, or you the customer.

Employees don’t want to be ‘engaged’, they want the same things you do:

Agency – to make their own ‘me-shaped’ dent in the universe.

Mastery – to learn and master new skills.

Autonomy – to be free to choose how we make their dent.

Purpose – to do this for something bigger than themselves, that has meaning beyond the sale.

Community – to do all this with ‘people like us’.

And the only experience the customer wants is one that gives them at least some of the same things you want:

Agency – to make their own ‘me-shaped’ dent in the universe.

Mastery – to learn and master new skills.

Autonomy – to be free to choose how we make their dent.

Purpose – to do this for something bigger than themselves, that has meaning beyond the sale.

Community – to do all this with ‘people like us’.

Perhaps if more businesses thought from this perspective, and tried to give their employees and customers what they really want, we’d have a happier, more productive world.

Virtual Reality
April 1, 2019

Virtual Reality

The right metaphor can get to the heart of your promise faster than a speeding bullet, creating an instant bond between you and the people you want to serve.

Metaphors work because they are simple, direct and emotional.

A good metaphor paints a picture worth a thousand words: “Longcroft Luxury Cat Hotel”.

The best metaphors conjure up an ongoing relationship: “Let us be Houston to your space mission”, “Welcome to our loving family”.

A metaphor that truly captures your promise acts as a compass for everyone involved in the business – your team, your collaborators, your suppliers and your clients. Whatever the situation, people will always know the right way to go.

But you can take it even further, by using your metaphor to actively design the way your business works, creating your own virtual world, where people take on different roles to play out what that metaphor means for your clients. If you get the metaphor right, it won’t even feel like work.

And that means you can make your business autonomous.

If everyone knows their part, has access to all the right props, and has a compass for when things go astray, they don’t need you to watch over them do they?

Overhead
March 25, 2019

Overhead

When you add a manager to a business, you add overhead. So the first effect of hiring someone to replace yourself as manager or supervisor – so you can work on your business instead of in it – is to take a real hit in profitability.

What if, instead of appointing someone new to manage your people, you appointed them to manage themselves? You could use the saving in overhead to invest in them instead, building a supporting framework, coaching, mentoring, training, and of course a fair share of the rewards.

When you want to expand to serve more customers or clients, you can simply add more people.

Those who’ve taken this approach have found the return on this kind of investment to be well worth it.

Engagement
March 12, 2019

Engagement

In my teens, I had a Saturday job in what was then a well-known department store. I worked behind the scenes in the kitchen, preparing cold sweets for the restaurant.

Breaks were the minimum the firm could get away with, and a bell rang for the start and the end of each break, to make sure you knew when it was time to go back to work. Lunch hour was 30 minutes.

One Christmas Eve, we cleaned the kitchen five times over, because in spite of the fact that nobody was shopping (everyone else in the High St. having gone home early), we were paid our £3.80 to work till 5:30 , so that’s what we would do – even if we had to make work up to do it.

In short, the firm did all they could to squeeze as much work out of us as possible. My co-worker, who made the sandwiches, broke down one Saturday, having been told for weeks that she wasn’t working hard enough, and was promptly replaced by two people.

The irony was, that the more they squeezed, the less energy we put in. All the initial enthusiasm and desire to please was wrung out of us within a few weeks. We worked to rule, doing as little as possible, and certainly not thinking about the customers.

In my next job in a small independent bakery and coffee shop, I learned a different way of working.

A bit of flexibility on my lunch hour was repaid with an early stop when I had a party to go to. I went the extra mile when it was needed, and it was noticed. I helped my colleagues out and they helped me.

I enjoyed that job. I’d start early because I looked forward to the day. I got on with my Saturday colleagues. I got to know customers. I was proud of my coffee shop. And I got paid more.

It doesn’t take much to create engagement – treat me like a responsible adult, and I’ll behave like one.

Inheritance. The power of DNA.
March 7, 2019

Inheritance. The power of DNA.

The power of DNA is that it allows for more than simply copying.

If it’s DNA is embedded deeply enough, a business can embody the values and vision of its founders, yet still evolve to meet the demands and opportunities of its current environment.

And that means it can become a legacy that delivers value for generations.

“If ten of thine ten times refigured thee:
Then what could death do if thou shouldst depart,
Leaving thee living in posterity? “

(Shakespeare, Sonnet V1)

Rules
March 1, 2019

Rules

How far can you take the idea of a guitar, and still end up with something recognisable as a guitar? … Read More “Rules”

Roundabouts
February 28, 2019

Roundabouts

Roundabouts depend on self-government. Drivers just need to follow a few simple rules: give way to traffic coming from the right; don’t get on the roundabout unless you can get off; signal left or right before you get on; signal left before you come off.

If the rules are followed, roundabouts prevent gridlock at busy times, without slowing down traffic the rest of the time.

Lately though, people seem to have forgotten how to use roundabouts. Maybe they weren’t told the rules; maybe they are used to different rules; maybe they don’t think the rules apply to them, or at least not right now, when they are in a hurry.

The problem is that if roundabout culture continues to change in this way, we will lose self-governance. Roundabouts will be replaced by traffic lights, and make things worse for everyone.

This is how culture changes. Gradually, almost imperceptibly, through daily usage, until the system has to be re-shaped around it.

For good or bad, we should at least do this with awareness, and perhaps even on purpose.

Self-Orchestration
February 27, 2019

Self-Orchestration

Orpheus is an orchestra without a conductor.

That doesn’t mean they are directionless, they have a score that tells them what to play.

That doesn’t mean they are mechanical, a core group guides the interpretation for every piece they play, and that core group changes every time.

That doesn’t mean they are homogenous, many players dip in and out, although a minimum number of experienced players ensure the Orpheus promise is kept for every performance.

Being conductorless doesn’t mean they are leaderless, it means everyone has to step up and take their turn at leading.

There’s always another way of succeeding. It just needs to be thought through.

Orpheus (the orchestra) has been doing this for more than 40 years.