CHAPTER 6 Involve Others in Crafting a Clear Purpose, Values, and Goals

Dave kissed Dee gently so as not to wake her and quietly headed into the kitchen. The sun was not up, but there was enough light to see that it would rise into a cloudy sky. When he arrived in the kitchen, Dave wasn’t surprised to see Beattie already nursing her tea.

“Sleep much?” she asked.

“Not at all,” Dave said. "Dee, on the other hand, is out like a light.”

“She’s emotionally exhausted. My poor sister.” Beattie took a sip of her tea. "Would you mind terribly joining me on a walk this morning? I need to talk this out.”

“Sure. Let me grab a pair of shoes.”

They spent the first twenty minutes talking about Dee—sharing fears and hopes as well as what Beattie had read about the latest medical technologies.

“I guess there’s really not much we can do at this point but wait—and be as supportive as possible,” said Beattie as they rounded a corner and headed back toward the house.

“I realize that. It’s just that I wish I could take some kind of action,” said Dave. "I get anxious when I’m powerless.”

“I understand,” said Beattie. After a moment, she changed the subject. "Want to talk about how things are at the office?”

“Things aren’t too bad,” Dave admitted. "Surprisingly, despite the fact that it was a dud profit-wise, the Primo product was good enough that we scored Primo II.”

“That’s the first good news I’ve heard all week,” said Beattie, smiling. "Congratulations.”

“Thanks, but don’t congratulate me too soon. If we don’t turn things around, Primo II will be another money pit, and my job could be in jeopardy.” Dave sighed. "Given what’s going on with Dee, that’s the last thing I need.”

“Don’t go there. Let’s stay focused on solutions,” said Beattie as they turned up the front steps.

“I called an all-department meeting yesterday and introduced everyone to the idea of collaboration. And I taught them about the Heart domain and the importance of listening to diverse opinions and establishing safety and trust. My new ally, Sarah, modeled it all by speaking up and supporting me.”

“Good for her!” said Beattie.

Back in the kitchen, Dave showed Beattie his notes, including the problems and solutions he had identified around safety and trust at Cobalt:

“That’s a good start,” said Beattie.

“What’s troubling me now,” Dave said, "is that I have no idea how to launch Primo II in a collaborative way.”

“Then it’s time to move to the Head domain. That’s all about what you know—your beliefs and attitudes about collaboration,” said Beattie.

“Fire away,” said Dave with a smile, scribbling on his note pad.

“Most people don’t realize there are two parts to collaborative leadership: vision/direction and implementation. Vision/direction is about going somewhere. If people don’t know where you want them to go, what’s the chance they’ll ever get there?”

“Zero,” admitted Dave.

“Right,” said Beattie. "For example, if you don’t make it clear that it’s safe for people to share their best ideas, they may hold back out of a need to protect themselves.”

“So whose responsibility is it to make sure vision and direction are clear?” asked Dave.

“What do you think?”

“I think it must be the leader’s responsibility,” said Dave. "It’s mine for Primo II and Jim’s for the whole company.”

“Exactly. It’s the leader’s responsibility to set the vision and direction. It’s important that others contribute to crafting the vision, but it’s up to the leader to make sure it’s set in stone.”

“How do you get people to act on it?” asked Dave.

“That’s where implementation comes in. That’s when people become responsible, empowered contributors, and the leader’s job is to be responsive in helping them live according to the vision and direction and accomplish the goals. We’ll get to implementation later, when we talk about the Hands domain.”

“Okay. So right now we’re talking about vision and direction.”

“Yes. And what really defined the vision and drove results at Blenheim was when we developed a common purpose, values, and goals. A clear purpose unites everyone around a common objective, values guide behavior, and goals provoke action—but only when the entire organization has a chance to contribute.”

“How did you do it?” asked Dave.

“Our top management took the first shot at it. They developed a draft purpose statement, a set of operating values, and strategic goals. Then they shared their draft throughout the organization, asking people what they liked and what they thought was missing from the proposal in order for them to engage with it and feel a sense of ownership.”

“They really asked everyone’s opinion?”

“Absolutely,” said Beattie. "People have a hard time committing to something if they’ve had no involvement.”

“There’s a learning right there,” said Dave. "Jim introduced a mission statement and values at Cobalt a while ago, but it was a top-down implementation. If you ask anyone today what our mission or values are, I guarantee they will shrug their shoulders. I agree with what you’re saying: when people aren’t involved in creating mission and values statements, psychologically they just stick them in a drawer and forget about them. I certainly don’t see our values reflected in anyone’s behavior. And regardless of what a plaque on the wall says, from the way people behave, you’d think Cobalt’s one and only mission is to make money.”

Dave thought about Wayne and his team. Some of them acted like wannabe Waynes, emulating his power broker style of leadership.

“We have a top-down, tough-guy culture that doesn’t focus on so-called soft skills like collaboration,” he said.

“We did, too,” said Beattie. "And that culture was suppressing hidden stores of talent and energy at Blenheim. Our leadership finally realized that the top-down naming of a clear purpose, values, and goals wouldn’t cut it—our people needed to have a part in it. Only when we involved everyone did they take our purpose seriously and make sure our values were clearly communicated and supported by company policies and leader behavior. That’s when our macho culture gave way to something far more powerful.”

That afternoon in the meeting room, Dave had just finished arranging the tables and chairs so people could sit in small groups. He was setting up the flip chart when he heard a voice.

“Would you like me to rearrange the room so we can all sit around one table?”

Dave looked up to see Steve Frazier, the newest member of Wayne’s team. Dave appreciated Steve’s willingness to help. Evidently, he hadn’t been tainted yet by Wayne’s dog-eat-dog leadership style.

“Thanks for the offer, Steve. Actually, I’m trying something new to see if I can get people to interact more. What do you think?”

“I like that idea,” said Steve with a smile. He then selected a seat at the table farthest from the front.

Dave thought Steve’s seating choice revealed a classic need for safety. Perhaps Wayne’s gotten to him after all, he thought.

Several more people came in, including Wayne, who took a look at the tables and said, "Hey, what do you know? We’re gonna have party games this afternoon!”

A few people snickered. Wayne and Dave had been peers before Dave’s promotion to vice president a few years ago, and Dave still wasn’t comfortable dealing with his boorish behavior. Wayne would always do whatever he could to disrupt meetings and get things on his terms. I can no longer let that happen if I’m going to accept my role as a silo buster, thought Dave.

More people came into the room until every seat was filled. As Dave stood at the front, an expectant silence came over the attendees.

“Hi, everyone,” Dave began. "Thanks for sending me the resources you’ll need for Primo II and your thoughts on where we fell short with Primo. I’ll be sharing some of those with the group today.”

Wayne spoke without raising his hand. "Do we really need to do all that? If my department gets involved with Primo II—and that’s a big if at this point—I already know what resources we need and how to get them. And it wasn’t my department that fell short with Primo. I’d like to just get on with what the company has hired us to do.”

This comment was over the top. Dave knew he couldn’t let Wayne’s disruption stand and instantly saw a way to turn the situation to his own advantage.

“I’m glad you brought up those points, Wayne, because they highlight what’s going to be different about this project. As I said in our meeting yesterday, we’re taking a new approach with Primo II. The emphasis will be on collaboration. So to answer your question, yes, we really do need to 'do all that’—to share with the group what went wrong last time and to brainstorm new ways of working together.”

No one spoke, but Dave saw several smiles around the room.

“One of the problems we had with Primo,” he continued, "is that although we looked like a project group, we were really working in silos—only sharing information when it was absolutely necessary. It was more like forced cooperation than collaboration.”

He uncovered a new page on the flip chart, which read:

“With Primo, we were missing the main ingredient under the Head domain. We didn’t have a clear purpose, values, and goals for the project—and that was my responsibility. We should have put our heads together to figure out where our project was going and what would guide our journey. A clear purpose will unite us as we move forward, values will guide our behavior, and goals will focus our energy.”

Wayne groaned loudly. "My only goal is to make money, not sit around talking about purpose and values. Besides, Cobalt already has a purpose and values.”

“Good point.” Dave challenged Wayne with a smile. "What are they?”

Wayne hesitated. "Something about being innovative and successful.”

Around the room a few heads nodded.

“That’s close,” said Dave. "Cobalt’s stated purpose is 'to keep our industry moving forward by innovating for success.’” He wrote the phrase on the flip chart.

“At your tables, I want you to work on a new purpose statement for Primo II that aligns with Cobalt’s purpose statement. I’ll give you about ten minutes. After everyone reports out, we’ll work on our values and goals.”

The room buzzed with conversation.

When ten minutes was up, Dave had each group report their suggested purpose statement. After a vigorous discussion, the group settled on the purpose of Primo II: "To keep our company moving forward by innovating for success.”

“Excellent!” said Dave as he wrote the new purpose statement on the flip chart. "That’s a great start. Now, let’s move to values. Can anyone remember any of Cobalt’s values?”

“Success,” came the first reply.

“Relationships,” came another. Both met with murmurs of agreement.

“Good—that’s two,” said Dave. "In fact, Cobalt has four rank-ordered values.” Dave turned to a fresh sheet and wrote:

“How do you like these four values?” he said to the group. "Should we keep them for Primo II, should we change one or two, or should we establish a whole different set? Talk about it at your tables for a few minutes and see what you come up with.” Again the room was filled with noisy enthusiasm as everyone started sharing their thoughts.

Dave soon pulled the whole group together to get their feedback. The consensus for Primo II was to keep the first three rank-ordered values but change the fourth value from Learning to Creativity.

“I think Creativity is a great fourth value for Primo II—particularly because it’s what will drive the innovation our client is looking for.”

Dave continued. "Now let’s zero in on the Success value for a minute. I think with Primo, we focused so much on achieving our departmental goals that the success of the project took a back seat. So back to your point, Wayne: you and your team may have a goal of making money, but that could actually be detrimental to Primo II’s Success value.”

Anthony Tate, one of Wayne’s team members, raised a hand and Dave pointed to him.

“How could our department making money be detrimental to success?” the young man asked. "I don’t get it.”

“Excellent question,” said Dave. "To answer that, I’ll share some feedback I got in response to my question about what didn’t work with Primo. As we can tell by the client’s decision to give us the Primo II contract, the product itself was innovative and brilliant. That certainly satisfies our new Creativity value.”

Wayne, whose department had developed the prototype, stood up and took a dramatic bow. There was a polite smattering of applause.

Lisa Virani, head of the production department, raised her hand. "Mind if I say something?”

“Sure, Lisa,” said Dave, eager to get Lisa’s input.

“Wayne, in some ways, your department’s focus on its own profit not only kept you from making necessary contributions but actually interfered with the overall success of the project. We really needed your involvement—but because true collaboration, as Dave has been describing it, wasn’t happening, Primo’s development was behind schedule early on. My department missed some key deadlines. This led to a series of overtime expenses and rush charges, which affected not only our budget but also those of at least three other departments.”

Dave stepped in. "Thanks, Lisa.” He turned to Wayne. "So Wayne, while your department might have met its benchmark and showed a profit, the company overall took a loss. Even though the client liked the product, Primo didn’t live up to Cobalt’s Success value.”

People shifted in their seats. This kind of straight talk was unusual at Cobalt and clearly was making some people uncomfortable.

“Now, wait a minute,” Wayne began.

Dave held up his hand. "Here’s the thing. I’m absolutely not here to point fingers. I was the lead VP on Primo, so if there’s any blame to be assigned, it belongs to me for not making our purpose and values clear so we could all get on the same page. The reason we’re doing this now is so that we can pull together to create a better outcome with Primo II. Now, are there any questions?”

At the back of the room, the new software engineer, Steve Frazier, raised his hand.

“What you’ve been describing sounds to me like a conflict between our Creativity value and our Success value. How does that get resolved if I’m developing a product that’s amazingly creative and innovative, but that may lead to cost overages?”

“Another great question!” said Dave. "The values are ranked 1 through 4, in order of importance. As you can see, Creativity is ranked number 4 behind Integrity, Relationships, and Success. That means if your creative effort is going to undermine the financial success of our project, it’s a no-go. Likewise, you don’t want your creative effort to harm any relationships or undermine the project’s integrity. The other three values come first.”

Wayne rocked back in his chair and folded his arms. "Okay, let’s be done. I need to get out of here.”

Dave was tempted to tell Wayne he was more than welcome to leave. But he knew that Wayne’s help in making resources available was critical to developing Primo II. If Wayne didn’t buy into this approach, Dave would be back where he started—or worse.

“We still need to settle on our key goals for Primo II. Back to your table conversations, everyone—see if you can identify three or four key goals that, if accomplished, will make the Primo II project a real winner.”

After the group spent several minutes brainstorming among their table teams, Dave pulled them back together again and summarized in a bulleted list on the flip chart the four key goals that had emerged from the discussion.

“It looks like we’ve all settled on our four key goals going forward.” The page read:

“Good work, people!” said Dave, and began to applaud. Within seconds, everyone in the room had joined in—even Wayne.

Dave beamed. "Thanks for your work on this. We’re going to stop now, but I want you to email me any further thoughts or reactions you have about our work today. I want this to continue to be a group effort among all the departments represented here. I appreciate your time, everyone.”

The room cleared quickly. As Dave started straightening up the tables, his thoughts went to Dee. The challenges of the day had given him a welcome reprieve from worrying about her cancer threat. Now his anxieties came flooding back. What if she does have cancer? What if she has to have a mastectomy? What if she dies?

“Hey, need a hand?”

Dave turned to see Sarah gathering up a few stray papers and pens.

“You okay?” she asked.

“Sure, fine,” Dave fibbed. "Why do you ask?”

“You look pretty upset.”

As they walked back to their offices, Dave shared the news about Dee.

“That’s tough, Dave,” said Sarah. "I’ll keep your wife in my prayers.”

In his office that afternoon, Dave captured for his report his thoughts on what he’d learned about the Head domain, crafting a clear purpose, values, and goals, and how it all applied to Primo II.