Remember the Gulf War? Remember “Storming Norman” Scwharzkopf - the American General who became a hero.
A lot of interesting things came out of that, not the least of which were stories about some of the techniques Norman used. They are the very same techniques that you and I can use to get things done.
One of the most succinct examples had to do with Storming Norman and his experience when taking command of helicopter maintenance earlier in his career.
He'd asked how much of the fleet was able to fly any given day, taking into account maintenance schedules. “75%” was the reply.
Wondering why it wasn't 73% or 74%, but always 75, he decided to set a NEW standard. “I don't know anything about helicopter maintenance, but I'm establishing a new standard of 85%” was his pronouncement. Sure enough, in very quick time, 85% operability became the norm.
It's interesting isn't it? People perform to expectations. If you set low expectations, that's what you get. Set them high, and it's truly amazing how your new level has a way of becoming reality.
Creating benchmarks - for your people AND for yourself - has an uncanny way of coming to pass.
Let me give you a case in point.
John Mitchell is a pharmacist in Stirling. John simply set benchmarks for his team.
Was it some complicated selling process?
He developed a checklist to help his people identify up-selling opportunities. He gave the checklist to his team, and then put up a white board where they could “chalk up” every successful up-selling transaction.
It became a fun challenge for them to beat the others and achieve the highest tally for the week. His “cost” for all this was a prize such as a dinner for two for the winner in his team.
But his reward was (and is) incredible and far-reaching! To his utter amazement, putting a performance standard on cross-selling now accounts for 50% MORE SALES value from every transaction. As he put it, he wouldn't have believed it until he saw it happen. (His profitability increase of course will be much, much more.)
Or, take the case of Ian Strathie of Wray Owen Funeral Directors.
He sent through an article from a U.S. Funeral Industry magazine. In it is the most comprehensive set of performance benchmarks you could imagine. Benchmarks that allow the members to strive to excellence AND measure their commercial prosperity.
For example, they carefully monitor such things as the total number and value of “pre-need” insurance sales, total number of deaths which were pre-funded, percentage of embalming to total calls, percentage of casket sales to total calls and so on.
Morbid? No, just sound and professional business practice.
They DON'T pay lip service to setting standards and benchmarks, they DO it and then monitor it. As the article goes, “These are people who want to excel, people who want to give every family they serve extra value for their dollar - these are people who look at everything with an open mind.”
And the truth is too that these people understand this great truth - what you can measure, you can manage. Again, what you can measure, you can manage.
Put it another way - if you're trying to manage something that you're not measuring, you've got a snowflakes chance, well, you know the rest - you've got very little chance of managing it effectively.
And another key too is to monitor the activity NOT the result. We'll talk more about that soon.
In the meantime, remember Storming Norman, and what you can measure you can manage. It might just win a few “wars” for you too.
As specialists in business development too, we can help you build yourself a better business. So give us a call. We can start off simply with a planning session before deciding to go on. That way you are under no pressure, and the choice to go forward is totally under your control. And remember what we said about our guarantee.
