“The Suit of Happiness”
“Every happy family is the same, but unhappy families are all different.” The opening of the Leo Tolstoy novel, Anna Karenina, captures our attention and immediately triggers a reflection of our personal perspective. I have no competence to comment on happiness, as I find it elusively indefinable and requiring some dangerous delving into tummy warming stuff and motivational poster maxims. But the point that Tolstoy shares is very insightful, particularly when we metaphorically apply it to the world of business performance. The key part of the phrase that really matters is the second, and with it, I will take literary liberty (Leo said it was OK), “poorly performing companies are all different.”
“Poorly performing companies are all different.” This perspective is so essential, and yet, so washed over in the way companies are counseled and trained on how to get better. Over the last decade the notable successes of organizations who have transformed their performance have generated some degree of misconception, sometime intentional, that they all did it one way, with one discipline, buying and wearing one type of business suit. In some unfortunate cases, the suit became more important than the buyer, so the buyer had to tailor himself to fit the suit…. Many of the great successful organizations actually tailored the suits, but that did not make the promotional banners.
Those with forethought and courage to exercise restraint remained true to the principle that “prescription without diagnosis is malpractice.” We certainly expect that our physicians hold to this rule as not only a business practice, but also as an ethical standard. That standard applies to business performance physicians and is, in my view, a foundation for principled and trustworthy behavior with customers, and a true north for self regulation within the enterprise. During the last decade, the relative stability of business processes made the possibilities of “self tuning” the performance improvement strategies possible, that is, the suits were tailored gradually. Agility was great to have, but not necessarily life saving. Not today. We have too much change, too little time, and fewer resources with which to chase success and do battle with the forces of failure. If we buy a new suit, it has to fit right and suit the purpose intended.
Before we get our next wardrobe of suits, let’s check the fit. You may find that you’ll do far better owning fewer suits that are well tailored, look really good, and feel great.
In the words of the suave and debonair Fernando, aka Billy Crystal, when next we meet I expect to say, “Darling … you look marvelous!”
