Andy is hacked off and now he knows why

Andy is a senior guy. He looks after a decent chunk of the company’s business and reports directly to the board. I’ve worked with him on and off since about 2001, though not for the last three years.

Recently, we caught up. He opened by saying he felt the company had lost its way. It clearly bothered him.

“I don’t know where we’re going anymore or even why we are here,” he said. “Seems like we are just churning turnover and scraping a profit. The only thing that gets discussed at exec level is profit. That and safety. We’re all running scared of what might happen if we have another incident.”

I asked: “What’s the company’s vision?” It sounded naïve.

He raised his eyes to the ceiling. “The usual,” he said. “To be the best, to be the provider of choice, that sort of thing.”

Then he blurted out: “It doesn’t mean anything to me and my people. It’s just bland corporate speak, probably intended for faceless shareholders. What I want is a sense of where we’re going, what ‘the best’ would actually look like. Not detail, but direction. Then I could share that with my people because, looking at them, I think they are just as lost as I am.”

He added: “I have my vision for my part of the business, but they’ve told me to reel it in because it doesn’t fit with the mission.”

“So what’s the mission?” I asked.

“Don’t even go there,” he said. “We have a mission statement, another paragraph of corporate gobbledygook. I don’t actually understand what it’s trying to say, let alone what the difference is between a ‘vision’ and a ‘mission’, you got any examples?”

Thinking about examples a recent one came to mind. I work with the board of a family owned national business and their mission is “to make life better for all our families”, including families of customers and suppliers. Rediscovering this has enhanced their sense of purpose and it’s now their raison d’être. It started with the founder three generations ago trying to make life better for his family, and it grew from there. They have started a conversation about this mission with their senior people and are going to extend it to all staff, workforce then customers and suppliers. They want their people to share this clarity of purpose so they too can act according to it.

I told Andy. At first he smiled then went quiet.

“What are you thinking?” I asked, feeling my way.

“So vision is where we are headed and mission is why we exist.” he said.

On a roll, I asked about his company’s values.

“Oh yes,” Andy smirked. “We have four words. They’re on our website. I think HR came up with them some while back.”

I asked what the words were, and it took him a few tries to remember.

“I’m guessing you don’t wake up in the morning and recite them,” I teased.

“I never really think about it,” he said. “I’m not sure anyone does. We never talk about this kind of stuff.”

I asked if he didn’t find that odd, since values inform our day-to-day behaviours, decisions and actions and they lead to our results.

He became agitated.

“What’s bothering you here Andy?” I asked the question and listened into the long pause that followed.

“I’ve just realised …….. there’s no leadership here,” he said. “And what really hacks me off is that I’m not providing any leadership myself. I’m just not leading.”

Probing further, I asked “What do you mean by leadership?”

Straight back he said “well, just what we have been talking about here: mission, vision, values and what I said before, direction not detail”

He stopped to reflect and then said “I’m going to talk about this with the board,” and then “thanks Dave I feel much better”

I couldn’t help thinking, ‘good luck with that one’, though kept it to myself. But if you’re reading this, Andy (obviously not your real name), give me a call if you want to bring that conversation to life.

Or give me a call anyway, it will be great to hear from you again.