A Standard For Success
September 21st, 2006 by Chief NutYears ago I read a bit by Tom Peters where he talked about giving employees “standards” instead of job titles or even descriptions of tasks. If you give a person a standard by which to work, they can invent the process on their own AND will be more apt to succeed at achieving the goal. At Acorn Creative’s most recent Monday morning meeting, I set the standard that project managers are NOT immediately responsible for creative design, web development or brand strategy development … their first and foremost duty is to “make sure the customer is happy“. Now THAT’S a standard! Will they succeed in achieving this? Let’s knock on wood. If they do (and they already do a great job), then we have few, if any, problems in the near future.
Similarly, Seth Godin asks “How much do you care?” with a revealing snapshot of two bathrooms in New York. Clearly one attendant is working with a higher standard than the other. They’re probably both being paid roughly the same and they both likely think they’re doing their job. Big difference in results, don’t you think?
Sooo, what standards are YOUR people using to measure their success.
