Leadership

Transition from “good to great” ?

Can you transform a "good" company into a "great" company? Yes, if you overcome your biggest barrier "good or good-enough" because Jim Collins discovered, "good is enemy of the great!"

Jim examined publicly traded 1,435 good companies' 40 years performance and identified 11 companies that became great producing cumulative stock returns of at least 3 times that of the general market for 15 years. Jim found that it takes discipled people, disciplined thoughts and disciplined actions to form a 'flywheel' that spins companies from good to great !

It all begins with Level 5 leadership, a fine blend of personal humility and professional will. Level 5 leaders have huge ambitions for the company & not themselves. Level 5 leaders put their egos aside, and focus on the company's long term interests. Next comes 'who' before 'what'. It's important to have right people on the bus before deciding where to go! You don't need best people - You need right people.

With right leadership & right people - you need to confront the brutal facts - eat that frog - change your strategy or stick head in sand. It might take a long time, but find a way to prevail. Build a Stockdale Paradox: be brutally honest about the situation, yet maintain faith that you would prevail in the end. Now it's time to find your 'hedgehog'. Hedgehog concept is: fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing. Find the intersection of three circles your passion, economic denominator & at what you can be best in the world - build a vertical where you can beat the world ! Walgreens' hedgehog was the best, most convenient drugstores, with high profit per customer visit - once they found it, they never looked back and continued the journey uphill.

Most of successful startups don’t become great companies. When startups grow, they start to introduce bureaucratic rules to make up for incompetencies. To avoid bureaucracy, hierarchy, and excessive controls, you need to introduce a culture of discipline through disciplined people, thought and actions.

Discipline should be the mantra of the organization. Inculcate the "culture of discipline" with an ethic of entrepreneurship to get superior performance. Last but not the least, think of technology as accelerator, not creator of momentum. Technology can fuel a momentum but technology can't initiate a transformation. Don't introduce technology just for the sake of technology.

If these six steps are practiced day-in day-out over a sustained period of time, it creates a 'flywheel' that spins good or good-enough companies into great companies. 

The good to great transition is a process like the transformation of Egg to Chicken! The remarkable revolution doesn't happen in a single day! The world only notices when the egg breaks its external shell and press reports "Stunning turnaround at Egg" similarly good to great transition will be noticed by press years later when your company is outperforming the competition by more than 3x for multiple years ! Most important lesson is keep the flywheel rotating because the moment it's stopped, the company starts sliding downwards.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Imran Jattala is National Director of Hult Prize Pakistan, contributing towards development of an Impactful Startup Ecosystem in Pakistan. He is Co-Founder of UrbanBazaar a Dubai based Startup. He has been Hult Global Ambassador for 2015-16 and is founding President of Hult Smart Cities & IoT Club at Hult International Business School Dubai.