Today there is one central question that all companies and organisations should ask themselves: What will the management team need in order to create the greatest possible value in an increasingly complex world with an accelerating rate of change and increasing unpredictability?
The more complex the world, the more difficult it is to answer questions on your own. Rational thinking increasingly needs to be replaced by a well-rounded understanding and a diversity of perspectives.
Although we are living in a VUCA-world, volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous world, we need to have the courage to make decisions and act – we need to do it together. For this the purpose of the management team is becoming increasingly important.
Based on the ambitions of the owners and the board of the company or organisation, the management team sets the framework and direction for the organisation. The management team focuses on what needs to be done – often on what others need to do.
But how much attention does the management team pay to themselves and what they are going to achieve together? There is a significant difference between the results achieved by the management team as a collective against the sum of the results created by the individual members in their respective areas of operations.
A common goal could be that a management team will take responsibility for making decisions being implemented effectively in the organisation. This goal naturally requires an individual responsibility on the part of each management team member. But since it is defined as the management team’s goal, it also demands on what the management team should spend its time on.
Another goal could be that the management team must ensure that the organisation’s processes are coordinated so that there is an efficient and value-creating flow. These goals cannot be achieved on their own by individual members. It requires dialogue, collaboration, coordination, adaptation and not least that everyone works together based on the same intention and direction.
In other words, no member can achieve the management team’s goals or solve the team’s tasks by themselves. The members of the management team are interdependent with each other to succeed. This, in turn, requires the management team to devote time to itself to discuss its purpose, collaboration and communication.
We usually assume that all of us have a common purpose of what we want to achieve in the management team, without really having talked it through together. Some members come to the management team with their departmental hat on and with the aim of raising their own operational issues.
No member can achieve the management team’s goals or solve the team’s tasks by themselves- Konrad Cassar Naudi
Others go to the management meeting to inform or be informed, and others are there to develop the strategic direction. A common factor is that most people sit in the management team because they have a position with responsibility for personnel and results coming with their own agendas and own interests. Without a common purpose of what the management team itself should contribute, it would be difficult to develop the collective ability and create value together.
In formulating its purpose, the management team also needs to consider the added value to be created for the team and its members. Management teams that do not feel that they are creating added value for themselves as a team and as individuals have more difficulty maintaining value creation for the organisation.
The added value for the team is primarily created through relational development and a positive collaborative climate. The added value for the individual is about personal development, learning and stimulation. The more we work together and think together (added value for the team), the more we can achieve (added value for the organisation) and the more inviting it is to join in and contribute (added value for the individual).
Three steps to follow by the management team:
Step 1. Put ‘your own time’ on the agenda and talk through what kind of added value you as a management team want to create for the organisation, the team and for you as individuals.
Step 2. Based on the overall picture of your value creation, formulate your intertwined purpose.
Step 3. Communicate the purpose to the employees to clarify what the organisation can expect from the management team. Being transparent and informing your employees about the management team’s purpose is also a way to welcome feedback and increase trust between employees and management.
Through these three steps, the management team sets the foundation and direction for what you should devote your time on in order to create the greatest possible added value for those you are there for. You have clarified the management team’s raison d’être – so the next step... ‘walk the talk’.
Konrad Cassar Naudi is a training and management consultant. He recently returned to Malta after 38 years abroad occupying different management positions in England, France, Ireland, Switzerland, Scotland and Sweden.