I read on a blog that this was a good book. I have to rush through it because it’s due back at the library today.
Good To Great for the Social Sector by Jim Collins is a monograph to accompany Good To Great. Collins brings out 5 issues and how the social sectors apply them differently from the business sectors.
Here are a few good points I want to remember:
Issue #1: Defining “Great” – Calibrating success without business metrics
“To throw our hands up and say, “But we cannot measure performance in the social sectors the way you can in a business” is simply lack of discipline. All indicators re flawed, whether qualitative or quantitative. Test scores are flawed, mammograms are flawed, crime data are flawed, customer service data are flawed, patient-outcome are flawed. What matters is not finding the perfect indicator, but settling upon a consistent and intelligent method of assessing your output results, and then tracking your trajectory with rigor.”(7-8)
Issue #2: Level 5 Leadership – Getting things done within a diffuse power structure
“Social sector leaders are not less decisive than business leaders as a general rule; they only appear that way to those who fail to grasp the complex governance and diffuse power structures common to social sectors.”(10)
“Level 5 leaders differ from Level 4 leaders in that they are ambitious first and foremost for the cause, the movement, the mission, the work – not themselves – and they have the will to do whatever it takes (whatever it takes) to make good on that ambition.”(11)
Issue #3: First Who – Getting the right poeple on the bus, within social sector constraints
“The great companies, in contrast, focused on getting and hanging on to the right people in the first place – those who are productively neurotic, those who are self-motivated and self-disciplined, those who wake up every day, compulsively driven to do the best they can because it is simply part of their DNA.”(15)
“…the number -one resource for a great social sector organization is having enough of the right people willing to commit themselves to mission. The right people can often attract money, but money by itself can never attract the right people.”(16-17)
Issue #4: The Hedgehog Concept – Rethinking the economic engine without a profit motive
The Hedgehog concept in the social sector with 3 intersecting circles:(19)
Circle 1: Passion – Understanding what your organization stands for (its core values) and why it exits (its mission or core purpose).
Circle 2: Best at – Understanding what your organization can uniquely contribute to the people it touches, better than any other organization on the planet.
Circle 3: Resource Engine – Understanding what best drives your resource engine, broken into three parts: time, money, and brand.
“The critical step in the Hedgehog Concept is to determine how best to connect all three circles, so that they reinforce each other. You must be able to answer the question, “How does focusing on what we can do best tie directly to our resource engine, and how does our resource engine directly reinforce what we can do best?” And you must be right.”(22)
Issue #5: Turning the Flywheel – Building momentum by building the brand
“This is the power of the flywheel. Success breeds support and commitment, which breeds even greater success, which breeds more support and commitment – round and around the flywheel goes. People like to support winners!”(24)
“Does the Red Cross truly do the best job of disaster relief? Perhaps, but the brand reputation of the Red Cross gives people an easy answer to the question, ‘How can I help?’ when disaster hits.(25)
“Consistency distinguishes the truly great – consistent intensity of effort, consistency with the Hedgehog Concept, consistency with core values, consistency over time.”(26)
“I’ve conducted a large number of Socratic teaching sessions in the social sectors, and Ive encountered an interesting dynamic: people often obsess on systemic constraints.”(29)
“I do not mean to discount the systemic factors facing the social sectors. They are significant, and they must be addressed. Still, the fact remains, we can find pockets of greatness in nearly every difficult environment – whether it be airline industry, education, healthcare, social ventures, or government-funded agencies. Every institution has its unique set of irrational and difficult constraints, yet some make a leap while others facing the same environmental challenges do not. This is perhaps the single most important point in all of Good to Great. Greatness is not a function of circumstance. Greatness, it turns out, is largely a matter of conscious choice and discipline.”(30-31)
A book Collins recommends is Managing Brand Equity by David Aaker. I’m going to request that from the library.