How to Lead Your Organization from Good to Great

The journey of transforming your organization from good to great begins with you transforming from good to great. Fortunately or unfortunately, the organization mirrors the leader at the helm of the organization. Fortunately because that means the power is in your hands to make this happen. Unfortunately because it is easier to work on the outside than on the inside.

For the organization to shift gears from good to great, there are actually 3 journeys that the CEO will have to undertake simultaneously:
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1. Business Excellence
2. Craft Mastery
3. Leadership Depth

Even before we begin to explore each in greater detail, let us define what is good and what is great to assess whether it is even worthwhile to be on this journey. A good organization makes profit but struggles to do so, is in the red ocean of bloody waters with competition nibbling at its toes, primary motive is financial survival, does not have any significant impact in the world, employees work half-heartedly and only for their salary. Employee engagement is a huge focus because disengagement is so rampant. Employees don't feel connected with their own selves or with each other or with their leaders. It's stressful to be working and everyone is waiting to hang-up their corporate boots some day to follow their heart, to come alive. There are offsites to discuss mission, strategy, future etc. and everyone uses these as a way to get a breather from the boring routine and nobody remembers anything once they are back at work. Nobody understands what love is or what's that got to do with work. Leadership is bottom-line and top-line focussed. Another word for good is mediocrity and the organization is only leading itself to a certain death sometime in the future.

A great organization is purpose-inspired; significantly and positively impacts human consciousness and elevates how we live; passion, commitment, accountability, self-inspiration and purpose light up the employees who joyously work with their heart, mind and soul; is in the blue ocean, is a market leader running a monopoly  with its nearest competitor miles away; is in an effortless self-sustaining cycle of creativity, innovation and profitability. No employee engagement programs are needed because employees are deeply engaged and connected with their work, with each other and with their leaders. Employees live their purpose of life through their work; leave the day at work feeling rejuvenated and refreshed. There's focus on value-based leadership with leaders creating a space of compassionate love through nurturing, coaching and leading authentically by themselves doing 10 times what they tell their people to do. This results in breakthrough performance, productivity and profitability.

Well, isn't leading your organization from good to great then a worthy goal?

If it is, then let's deep dive into what it takes to make that happen. There are three journeys that the CEO, the leader at the helm of the organization would need to undertake simultaneously and take their people along with them on these journeys: 
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1. Business Excellence

Business Excellence is the outer journey of professional success by living our purpose through our work, leading our business from good to great, generating a healthy Triple Bottom Line (3P - Profit, People, Planet); creating a legacy by making a massive difference to our employees, customer communities, business partners, investors and all other stakeholders.

This is a journey over 5 mountains:

Mountain 1: Mountain of Purpose: Inquiring into his / her own Purpose, the CEO identifies a real experiential link between his / her purpose of life and what the organization is up to in the world. Without this alignment, the organization remains trapped in mediocrity - the inevitable fate of every 'good' organization that never steps into greatness.

For the organization to be on the path of greatness; the CEO has to be on the path of greatness, committed to make a huge difference to the communities they are a part of, energised by a vision to transform the world, inspired to leave the world a better place than before their arrival on earth.

Mountain 2: Mountain of Value: Discovering your organization's Blue Ocean and a Compelling Value Proposition that has prospects chase you to become your customers instead of your business having to chase the customers. Until you offer something so compelling that customers chase you, you are playing a losing game.

Mountain 3: Mountain of Growth: Iterating to create a robust Profitable, Repeatable, Scalable, Efficient, Sustainable and Optimised Business Model - one that is standardised, lean, margin-positive, systematised, and continuously improving through data-driven decisions -giving your business a solid foundation of long-term value-creation for your customers and your organization.
Here’s how you test whether you are ready to cross this mountain:

a. Profitability: Is the cost of customer creation, product / service development, delivery and post-sales service substantially less than what the customer is willing to pay for?
b. Repeatability: Can you repeat the entire value creation cycle (from customer creation to post-sales service) following the same steps, with the same inputs and outputs, every time - delighting the customer the same extraordinary way each time?
c. Scalability: Can the entire process run without you through systems, people, and processes  hat function independently of your personal involvement?
d. Efficiency: Are you minimising waste and maximising value in time, effort, and cost; delivering more with less, across all functions?
e. Sustainability: Are your business decisions enabling long-term growth without depleting your people, your resources, or the environment?
f. Optimisation: Are you continuously improving your business model through feedback, data, and innovation; upgrading systems, decisions, and strategies to create greater value over time?

Mountain 4: Mountain of Scale: Once your business model is profitable, repeatable, scalable, efficient, sustainable, and optimised, it's time to scale up.

Mountain 4 is about expanding your organization's impact and reach through deep relationships, operational mastery, unmatched service, technology as a multiplier, and a commitment to building a future-ready business.

It's about scaling-up your business through Nurturing Relationships, Operational Excellence, Extraordinary Service, Leveraging Technology and Sustainable Sustainability. 

a. Nurturing Relationships
i. Nurturing Customer Relationships
→ This is Strategy and Strategy Execution. Strategy is a plan of action to make a massive difference to our customers.
→ It's about creating a powerful Value Proposition that deeply serves our customers by marrying what’s missing in the world for them with Craft Mastery.
→ It requires us to coach our team to work from Being of Service consciousness.
→ Frameworks to leverage: Blue Ocean, Verne Harnish’s Scaling-up’s 7-Strata, Alex Osterwalder's Business Model Canvas

ii. Nurturing Employee Relationships
→ This is about building a super-performing, nurturing, learning culture
→ Nurturing means creating emotional safety, engagement and growth
→ Implementing a Leadership model that enables building of a super-performing, nurturing, learning culture through coaching
→ Putting in place learning systems to enable continuous learning, growth and contribution
→ Frameworks to leverage - Patrick Lencioni’s Five Dysfunctions of a Team, OKRs + CFRs, Verne Harnish's Scaling-up People

iii. Nurturing Relationships with all Other Stakeholders
→ Nurturing relationships with investors, business partners, suppliers and communities to create authentic, long-term, impact-creating partnerships.
→ Frameworks to leverage - Business as a Force for Good

b. Operational Excellence
i. Bottoms-up continuous process innovation to reduce costs, reduce time to do any specific activity and increase quality.
ii. Creative and innovative ways to reduce our and our team’s time, effort and resources; while increasing value for our customers, employees and all other stakeholders of our Business.
iii. Frameworks to leverage - 1FOR5 (1 Action to Fulfil 5 Intentions), DLCM (Do Less to Create More), Verne Harnish’s Scaling Up Methodology, David Parmenter's Winning KPI Methodology

c. Extraordinary Service
i. Serving, delighting and contributing to our customers with such amazing service, at the level they have no right to expect.
ii. Frameworks to leverage - Service Design Thinking, Net Promoter System (NPS) with Root-Cause Loops

d. Leveraging Technology
i. Using technology not just as a tool, but as a strategic enabler—to simplify, amplify, and accelerate making a massive difference to our employees, customers and all stakeholders.
ii. Automating the routine, enhancing insight, and scaling impact.
iii. Frameworks to leverage:
→ Artificial Intelligence / Machine Learning Readiness Models
→ Digital Transformation Canvas
→ Tech Stack Alignment to Customer Journey

e. Sustainable Sustainability
→ Building a future-ready business by integrating sustainability into strategy, operations, and culture.
→ Going beyond compliance to contribution.
→ Frameworks to leverage: Rajeev Peshawaria’s Sustainable Sustainability Model

Mountain 5: Mountain of Mastery: Creating a Self-Sustaining Business. The fifth stage is when the organization no longer needs you and can function effectively without you, as you have not only created an organization with strong, robust fundamentals but also have created succeeding leaders to take the organization to its next level of evolution with even greater velocity.

You are now free to contribute to the entire industry, leading its transformation through your thought leadership, impacting a lot more organizations simultaneously as you sit on multiple Boards of Directors and bring about social change, contributing to the evolution of the human race bringing people and countries together through who you have become as a human being as an outcome of leading your organization from good to great.
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2. Craft Mastery
For the organization to cut-over to greatness, there is no other option but to be the world's best in whatever the organization is upto. And, for that to happen, the employees need to be playing the game to be the world's best in whatever they are doing as part of the organized work. For the employees to be on the learning path to be masters of their domain, their craft; you absolutely guessed it - the CEO has to be playing the game to be the master of the domain the organization is in. This is also a journey over five stages. 

Stage 1. Amateur: This is the stage of Passive Learning, when you learn on your own through reading works of masters in the field, training yourself through material available in the public domain.

Stage 2. Professional: This is the stage of Active Learning, when you implement whatever you are learning to make a difference to your chosen target community. 

Stage 3. Expert: You become an Expert by learning through Apprenticeship, when you learn directly from an existing Master of your Craft.

Stage 4. Mentor: You become a mentor when you coach others to become Experts in your domain.

Stage 5. Master: You finally become a Master when you coach Experts to become Mentors in your domain. This is when you go inside your craft and become it.


3. Leadership Depth
You cannot lead your organization from good to great without deepening who you are as a human being, without being on your own journey of transformation and evolution from good to great. This is a journey over 5 Gears by dropping Limiting Habits and inculcating Growth Habits to create the highest level of fitness and well-being across all the 4 bodies (Physical, Emotional, Intellectual / Mental, Spiritual) of your Being. 

Each Gear is about elevating one’s consciousness by developing a specific leadership muscle, working at the level of physical, emotional, mental and spiritual habits. 

Gear 1: Agility of Mind: Discovering your destiny, your purpose this life-time. Strengthening Agility of Mind™ leadership muscle to experience your own self as extraordinary. 

Gear 2: Being of Service: Making a difference through your work, playing your big game with peace in your heart and mind. Strengthening Being of Service™ leadership muscle to see the light in everyone and experience each one as extraordinary. irrespective of however they are and however they are not. 

Gear 3: Communicating Powerfully in the World of Others: Experiencing joy of effortless existence as you experience life itself as extraordinary and the world around you experiences you as extraordinary as you strengthen your Communicating in the World of Others™ leadership muscle. There is deep stillness within, with nowhere to go and nothing to prove with the experience of oneness with the Universe.

Gear 4: Delivering on your Word: Experiencing deep fulfilment as others in your space experience themselves as extraordinary. The Authentic Leader in you is born as you get access to significant Power to Create™ by strengthening your Delivery on Your Word™ leadership muscle. 

Gear 5: Excellence: People in your space experience each other as extraordinary. Your presence causes a shift in the space around you as you inspire a culture of trust, partnership and compassionate love; with each one supporting the other to be successful. The Master in you is born, as you strengthen your Excellence™ leadership muscle to have your Power to Create™ in full bloom. You become The Master Creator. You intend; it gets created effortlessly and almost instantaneously.

The most efficient way to travel on this path is to synchronise each of the five stages of Business Excellence, Leadership Depth and Craft Mastery because the three journeys are inter-linked. One journey is not possible without the other two. If you progress on one journey, your growth will stop till you don't progress on the other two journeys. 
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Yes, it is a long haul forward. Why should you make your life difficult to be on this path? Because this path supports you to have it all -
i. Deeply fulfilling, successful, profitable business supporting you to live your purpose of life; gifting you with impact, contribution and financial freedom
ii. Loving, harmonious, positive, uplifting relationships at work, at home and in the world
iii. Happy, healthy, confident, responsible kids with their genius joyfully expressed
iv. Nourishing, nurturing yourself to the highest level of health, fitness and joyous well-being - physically, energetically, emotionally, mentally, spiritually
v. Making a massive difference through the work you do

​The old model of leadership only gives you professional success but at the cost of everything else. In this new model of leadership, you have it all. Then, why not?

Keep learning, growing and contributing to joyously lead yourself and your business from good to great, realize your dreams and have it all with ease and grace; while having lots of fun and adventure along the way 💜

Loving you,
j.
Original Article: 5-Aug-2017
2nd Version: 13-Apr-25