10 Points to Consider When Building a Culture of Excellence.

10 Points to Consider When Building a Culture of Excellence

Do you want to get more from your people and build a high performing culture? Of course but how do we build a high performing team and culture?

You don’t grow your business – your people do so it’s important to have people trained to perform and engaged in the work they do.

Your people can and do make a difference.

Research shows that engaged staff have a dramatic impact on profitability. Gallup found that companies with an engaged workforce outperformed their competition by 147% in earnings per share.

So how do you build a culture of excellence?

One of the main indicators of a healthy culture is the level of engagement of staff. Do you know how engaged your staff are? If not I recommend you find out so that you can identify the areas you need to improve in.

10 Points to Consider

1. It all starts with recruitment

Getting the right people into your business is a critical success factor. Not enough thought is given to the recruitment process. What is the purpose of the role? What competencies are required? Does the candidate reflect the values of your organisation? Will they fit the culture? Take care to have a robust recruitment process.

2. Get poor performers off your bus

Your poorest performer is the level of excellence in your organisation. Frightening isn’t it. If you are not already dealing with your poor performers you need to be proactive and act. Confront the cause of the problem. Do they need training? Are you giving them the feedback they need so that they can improve? If you are interested in holding poor performer’s accountable then check out the short video at

3. Communication is critical

Your staff needs to know what is expected of them. Set clear, specific expectations and goals. This means having those courageous conversations with candour and openness. Have you communicated the vision and purpose of the company? Do they know why their work is important?

4. Build high levels of trust

This is a critical component of highly effective teams and organisations with a great culture. To get trust give trust first. Trust is about vulnerability and being comfortable with being open. Do your people believe that you have their back, all day, every day? High performing teams support each other, encourage each other and they trust each other. A key aspect of building trust is courage. The courage to say, “I’m not sure”, “I don’t know”, “I was wrong”, “I’m sorry”. Sounds obvious yet it is hard to do.

5. Doing meaningful work is a motivator and a factor in engagement

A not for profit organisation raising funds for the homeless grappled with how to increase donations. To increase performance half of their call staff was given a small incentive while the other half were taken out to personally meet the homeless they were helping. The result! Those who received a small incentive achieved a small increase in donations. However, those who had met the homeless had a dramatic increase in donations collected. Those who met the homeless understood the purpose of what they were doing. They saw first-hand that their work was meaningful and worthwhile.

 6. Have measures of performance

These are the key performance indicators (KPIs) that indicate how the business is tracking and if there is likely to be trouble ahead. KPIs are more than revenue and profit. What’s your number of leads like, your conversion rate, your waste, # of errors? How would you know you are on track? KPIs are about identifying when and where performance is slipping. Use the data to make a decision, provide feedback and to show progress. Seeing positive progress is a great motivator. If you would like a copy of my e-book on performance indicators to drop me a line.

7. Encourage risk-taking and innovation

Dance on the edge of failure! You might be on the right track. However, if you don’t move, you’ll be run over by your competition. Stretch and challenge yourself and your staff. Test ideas and constantly look for a better way. Innovate.

8. Build a culture of caring

When you genuinely care about yourself and your staff it shows. Your staff want you to care about them, to listen to them, to help them feel proud and help them grow.

9. Celebrate

Celebrate the arrival of your new talent. We tend to do things back to front and celebrate people leaving the company when we should celebrate their arrival.

10. Celebrate your wins and recognise achievement

Involve your team to set stretch 90-day goals broken down into smaller milestones so it’s easy to see progress. This is your opportunity to reward and give recognition. And no it doesn’t have to be expensive. It could be beer and pizza, time off or even a simple trophy.

So that’s it – 10 points to consider when building a culture of excellence and improving performance in your business. I’ve spent years helping organisations improve their performance so if I can help with any of the points above or you want more information email infor@strategicfit.co.nz

3. Know the size of your business and select a coach accordingly

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4. Choose a consultant who has both business skills as well as coaching skills

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5. Continuous learning

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Conclusion

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