The north is the direction of our greatness, at the personal and organizational level. It answers the question “where do we want to go?”
The focus today is the east, which embodies our purpose, drivers, motivations and values. It answers the question “why are we doing it?“ The east keeps us going. It fires us up and sustains us through the highs and lows of our life and work journey.
If north is our vision, the east is our culture. Peter Drucker, the management guru, has said “Culture eats strategy for breakfast”. In a nutshell, this means that no matter how great the business strategy is, the plan will fail without a company culture that encourages people to promote and implement the strategy.
As an example, a strategy focused on giving customers a great experience only works when embodied through a culture of surprising customers, from the CEO to the front liners and the back-office operations.
One of my most memorable hotel accomodation experiences to-date was in Chennai, where we travelled to deliver a 1-week global leadership development program for The World Bank Group. My husband and I arrived in Chennai from Singapore late in the evening and tired from the travel, and were looking forward to a good rest. The heartfelt smiles, warm hospitality and singular attention from the person at the entrance door, to the front desk staff, to the housekeeping staff made it very homey (a luxurious one😃) right away.
Every hotel staff gave attention to detail and a personalised service. For instance, I was delighted that on our second day, the staff at the breakfast place knew my name, and offered my preferred coffee and egg style after I just casually mentioned it on day 1. I did not fill-up any form, nor had to repeat it the next day.
There was also one night that a servicing of the bathroom faucet was needed. The plumber from the housekeeping was quick to fix. Even after it was fixed, the front office pro-actively offered us the option to move to another room. The next day, we received a personalized written message from the CEO. He reached out to apologize about what happened and shared a direct access to his office. We overwhelmingly appreciated the timeliness and the actions taken.
It’s a story of a potential customer dissatisfaction that was immediately turned around and became a very positive customer experience. What happened surprised us, and we ended up earnestly writing a commendation letter for their hotel and staff.
It’s an example of a fully aligned strategy and value strongly embodied by every employee and leader, where everyone is clear with one North and is motivated by the same East.
Do you have any story at work or in life of an aligned, or mis-aligned, strategy and culture? Let’s learn from each other!
Related post:
The East ~ Where do you want to take your Organization?
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