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I remember well when I first discovered the work and thoughts of Russell Ackoff. He is one of the founders of System Thinking (Lean) and his ideas are very insightful and valuable. One that struck home was the point that there is a big difference between doing things right, and 'doing the right things'. Doing things right is about achieving efficiency; 'doing the right things' is about achieving effectiveness. The point is that it's possible to be efficiently doing the wrong thing, and so not achieve the desired result. 

A simple example of this could be people lost in a jungle who organise themselves into very efficient teams to find food and water and cut their way through. But to then be going the wrong way so they are efficiently going deeper into the jungle.

You see this type of thing a lot in many organisations. People efficiently getting on with their job, doing the best they know how, to achieve what they believe is the right thing. But if each team or department has a different idea of what is the right thing, they can easily be doing the wrong thing or cancelling out each other's efforts by pulling in different directions.

The solution is to ensure there is a common understanding of what the right thing is. And it's the responsibility of Leaders to establish and communicate this. It could be called the business Purpose, the Vision, the Mission, or whatever suits the organisation and the situation. It must be easy to understand (that means it needs to be short and expressed in simple language) and it will need to be viewed by a clear majority of employees as worthy of their efforts. But when such a thing is in place and it is well communicated to all employees, their efforts will create a synergy that multiplies their effect and great things can then result. It can enable ordinary people to create extraordinary outcomes.

So, I suggest that you ensure your organisation has such a thing in place, so that your colleagues will be able to do the right things right to make 2017 an outstanding year.

© Copyright Chris Daffy