{"id":6583,"date":"2015-08-05T16:04:13","date_gmt":"2015-08-05T08:04:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/elijahconsulting.com\/?page_id=6583"},"modified":"2016-11-24T11:06:10","modified_gmt":"2016-11-24T03:06:10","slug":"culture-eats-strategy-for-breakfast-how-about-lunch-and-dinner","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/elijahconsulting.com\/culture-eats-strategy-for-breakfast-how-about-lunch-and-dinner\/","title":{"rendered":"Culture Eats Strategy for Breakfast. How about Lunch and Dinner?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Culture<\/a>Peter Drucker talked about culture eating strategy for breakfast. Being of Chinese origin, I wonder about lunch and dinner as well. And then tomorrow\u2019s breakfast, lunch and dinner. That doesn\u2019t mean that I have a poverty mentality, it\u2019s just that people of Chinese origin where I come from have this reputation of eating everything that is carbon-based and feasting at every conceivable festival. No, I talk about Culture eating Strategy, not just for Breakfast but for Lunch and Dinner as well, because I know the influence words have on our thinking. Like most people, I like quotes and use quotes in my work. We like to use quotes because they help us seem smarter than we really are. You don\u2019t? Well, I do. Nothing wrong with wanting to put our best foot forward. Just don\u2019t stop there. I talked about this in \u201cDo You Know The Story?<\/strong><\/a><\/span>\u201d In that post, I put up a definition from the \u201cUnabridged Devil\u2019s Dictionary\u201d that a quotation is \u201cThe act of erroneously repeating the words of another.<\/em>\u201d Now, we may laugh at that, but isn\u2019t it true in many cases? Erroneously repeating the words of another, not so much in form as in substance. I would say that Drucker never meant that we should focus on culture and throw strategy to the four winds. Being who he was, methinks he meant the best-laid plans that Boss can Pen would come to an untimely end; if people just won\u2019t pull with you, they will not want to see it through. We do need to know the story behind the quotes we use so often.<\/span><\/p>\n

Entrepreneur carried an article by James Clear in 2013, \u201cForget Setting Goals. Focus on This Instead.<\/strong><\/a><\/span>\u201d That sparked off this article. James was indeed very Clear in his article, (and my tongue is firmly in cheek) and I\u2019d like to expand on it, if I may. I think it\u2019s important for me to get my own thoughts clear on things like Goals and Systems, which James talks about, because there are other parallels. Strategy and Tactics. Strategy and Culture. Lead Measures and Lag Measures, which I wrote about in \u201cLead Measures. Lag Measures. So What?<\/strong><\/a><\/span>\u201d Leaders and Managers. The list goes on and is a clear indicator of our very human preference for oversimplification due to a drastic dearth of Diligence and an overabundance of the trait referred to by Patrick Lencioni as the Avoidance of Accountability. I have just two points to highlight.<\/span><\/p>\n

1. The Goals determine the Systems.<\/u><\/strong><\/span><\/h1>\n

By that I mean that people, and that includes organizations, have a rather annoying tendency to set goals that aren\u2019t really goals at all. Lose weight? Would that motivate you? How about \u201cchanging shape\u201d instead of \u201closing weight\u201d? Sounds better? Run the Marathon? Lose all motivation to continue training after you have<\/strong> run it? How about simply \u201cmaintaining robustness throughout life?\u201d Marathons, after all, do teach us how to endure. Life isn\u2019t only about Marathons, of course, it\u2019s also a series of sprints. It\u2019s also about walking slowly and admiring the view. Actually, life is like a campaign. Different tempi (or tempos, depending on which side of the Atlantic you\u2019re from) for different occasions. How about being the preferred vendor for an organization\u2019s IT needs? Is that a goal that would get your people up in the morning, raring to go? Would something like \u201cEnhancing your corporate senses for optimal responsiveness\u201d appeal to you more? It certainly would to me!<\/span><\/p>\n

I think some people find goals exhausting because they have set the wrong goals. Goals which are not ennobling. Goals that are not positively future-focused and possibility-peripheric (as opposed to possibility-centric<\/strong>. Tell me what you think!) Goals which they have set, not because it\u2019s in their DNA to do so, but because it\u2019s, well, fashionable to set goals. Setting the right, ennobling goals is extremely important. They lift you up and provide you with the energy to formulate systems that will help you get to those goals. What are some ennobling goals you can set for yourself and for your business right now? Write them down!<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Unrealistic<\/a><\/p>\n

2.\u00a0Forecasting is actually feasible when you know what\u2019s possible and what\u2019s not.<\/u><\/strong><\/span><\/h1>\n

I\u2019ve heard a few people say that setting goals is unrealistic because you can\u2019t tell the future. Well, of course we can\u2019t tell the future, but we certainly anticipate it. We certainly forecast it. If we don\u2019t anticipate the future, how do we catch a ball flying through the air? How do we even walk? I think saying that goal-setting shouldn\u2019t be done because we can\u2019t foretell the future is equivalent to sticking our heads in the sand. Of course we can forecast and of course we can anticipate. We won\u2019t be right all the time, but 70-80 percent is pretty good. Works for me. A culture where people wait for things to be 100% right before taking action is a dead culture. Nothing moves. Anything that does move, is shot down. Setting goals is great because of the level of uncertainty involved, and I do mean Heisenberg. It means taking prudent risk and managing that risk so that the business outcomes you have set for yourself become manageably realistic. So what about all that hoopla about setting BHAGs, i.e. Big, Hairy Audacious Goals? Well, BHAGs are ok, if you make sure they\u2019re made of leather or other good materials. What do I mean by that?<\/span><\/p>\n

Contrary to what many so-called gurus would have us believe, there is<\/strong> such a thing as an impossibility. Life can only come from life. Life does not arise from spontaneous generation, no matter how organic you try to make it. I agree with Einstein that imagination is more important than knowledge, and even then you\u2019d better find out what the context was when he said it; if he indeed did say it. It is foolishness to indulge in flights of fancy. There is a difference. So, when I say that it is ok to have BHAGs, provided those BHAGs are made of good materials, I mean that it is perfectly ok to have your Big, Hairy, Audacious Goals if they are based on realistic possibilities and not on impossibilities like life arising from inorganic molecules spontaneously. I remember a joke about a Marine exclaiming \u201cNothing is impossible for me!\u201d only to have his buddy retort \u201cOh yeah? Try pushing toothpaste back into the tube!\u201d Get the picture?<\/span><\/p>\n

So, forecasting is definitely possible, provided we are willing to look at the facts right in front of us and make reasonable projections based on impersonal forces and checking for past patterns, especially if conditions are not too different from what they are now and what they were in the past. Go ahead, make your (fore)cast!<\/span><\/p>\n

Conclusion<\/strong><\/span><\/h1>\n

Expand your vision. Be willing to zoom in as well as zoom out. Use AND more than you use OR. Focus on strategy and goals, not systems, not culture. Be disciplined<\/strong> to work hard within your systems and within your culture. If you are willing to do this, I will forecast that you, by and large, will be pretty successful. In your business goals. And I dare say in your life goals as well!<\/span><\/p>\n

\"Good<\/a><\/p>\n

Download the pdf.<\/a><\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Peter Drucker talked about culture eating strategy for breakfast. Being of Chinese origin, I wonder about lunch and dinner as well. And then tomorrow\u2019s breakfast, lunch and dinner. That doesn\u2019t mean that I have a poverty mentality, it\u2019s just that people of Chinese origin where I come from have this reputation of eating everything that […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":4775,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/P2EiEv-1Ib","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/elijahconsulting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/6583"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/elijahconsulting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/elijahconsulting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elijahconsulting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elijahconsulting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6583"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/elijahconsulting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/6583\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8602,"href":"https:\/\/elijahconsulting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/6583\/revisions\/8602"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elijahconsulting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4775"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/elijahconsulting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6583"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elijahconsulting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6583"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/elijahconsulting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6583"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}