Your new Big Three: Diversity, Unity and Outside-in Objectivity are your crucial mix to success in the WEconomy
Monday May 7, 2018
By Bill Van Eron,
Regenerative Success Systems at Headwaters Marketing &Innovation
Growing up in the ‘melting pot’ of the world -- NYC -- immersion with all ethnicities, genders and points of view shaped my values and enriched my design career.
That same constant stimulus, open dialog and deeper value connections familiar to designers, now yields insight to how success is defined and realized today…finally.
That was NYC and not what outsiders see or hear. Personal and business Immersion into your ecosystem reveals value and meaning key to success. Most businesses fail to see, so how to begin?
Prioritize “we” over “I”. I can say firsthand -- leaving my design comfort zone job in HP and immersing myself sequentially in HP sales, channels, PR, analysts and with customers -- that conscious design revealed far greater business instincts to transform business usual to business awesome. This blog opens that dialog about melting away barriers that limit personal and organizational success, by embracing values that enable it.
Today, we need to engage all that matters internally & externally beyond just words; as trustworthy actions and in open constructive dialog.
This is your ecosystem that determines your success. Embrace a new breed of business & personal consciousness that accepts accountability, as a natural human expression of trust and recognition to those we say are important to us. Given the diversity that businesses have here and abroad, it starts with respecting and welcoming the process. In NYC, what we experienced as our core culture -- with ongoing practice -- great things happened. Few ever got it right the first time, but the effort was respected by all, thus creating a basis for unity. So, open the dialog in your business and across communities that define your ecosystem. This is what todays winners will do as genuine commitments to leadership, teams, markets and their social footprints. This begins your natural journey towards more conscious enablement and recognition of all that care to matter.
When people care to ask better questions, share ideas, that starts a natural transformation so all benefit when we feel inclusive in shaping our lives, careers and workplaces.
Think about it. Great questions evoke ideas and open dialog that begins a platform of unity that gets us all past the walls that stopped advancement before. Improving your culture, core priorities, processes and innovation readiness is harder to do alone as I had to do decades ago, yet insight-inspired courage persevered. It’s easy to feel left out, minimalized and emotionally disconnected when in an inadvertently closed culture. We should know by now that any definition of “all” of us has to work across an increasingly diverse workplace and global communities. Lose “them” in your vocabulary, as there is only “us”, which is why early adopters embrace this as a WEconomy.
Defining Diversity, Unity and Outside-In benefits beyond the obvious:
- Employees define an organization’s success by what they value and how enabled they feel in advancing those values. For too long, 77 and then 70% of global employee’s expressed concern that they feel emotionally disconnected from work. Recently, Gallup captured that only 15% of global workers actually feel emotional connected and enabled. Improve that by a lot and win big.
- Most organizations inadvertently lose their objectivity as soon as they open, they become closed internally focused businesses. Many “experts” that accepted the status quo without challenge, express disbelief when an objective and qualified view is offered from someone outside. Look at the symptoms, such as: higher employee turnover rates, a static business model, slumping sales, marketing and revenues. I have personally surprised dozens of thorough, expert Fortune 50 and Fortune 500 companies with what I was able to synthesize clearly, that they all missed. Thank God they were open to hearing it then, as once they accepted these objective insights, their true capabilities kicked in, fully energized to do work that matters. It’s a near instantaneous transformation for many, versus the fear of interruption some have. Success is repeatable, just as those patterns that limit us often repeat ,unless we design in objective interrupts and fresh perspectives to what matters.
As of late, I think the best advisory is more as a catalyst to success, than what I see others profess or fear. Not about me; more about enabling the need for people within jobs, and organizations as a whole to lift their heads up, look outwardly and embrace the values that shape internal purpose and external regard as a unified brand. The best of us suffers a loss of objectivity when we get too close, or too comfortable. So a bi-annual or ongoing outside-in infusion is a healthy interjection to refresh what makes you great, and take it to new heights.
- Organizational design still lags in enabling people to master their own future and value. We offer a new organizational model that makes transformation powerfully simple; meaning more can jump in easier and champion the needs of today with skills modelled for now and tomorrow as more care to.
- People talk about getting out of the box as a singular action or singular box. But they fail to see the system. Imagine how many boxes can collaborate and all rise higher. The more we understand our ecosystem and shift from competing to enabling dialog, the more aligned those ecosystems become to values all members support and share. As a few examples: we are working to put education and industry on an even keel so students are relevant when they graduate. We now have a reliable path to manage seamless transformation by enabling greater business humanity. Soon more of us will be able to do this by just having a better value compass. I also see a great use of AI to create a tuned online entrepreneurial support ecosystem for startups on up to Fortune 50. Why accept failure when success can be naturalized through interdependent alliances and thinking, so all win? Why is it designers can see all of this quite clearly? My next blog addresses this as a true revelation you can apply.
- Accountability should not be treated like a negative four-letter word. We all need to back our claims that a team, organization, stakeholders, and ultimately our customers are important to us. As well, we can now assess our value to them through a shared window of accountability. Improvements can be made and success can be recognized, leveraged and rewarded. This is integral to assuring inclusion, an open culture, outside-in objectivity and new thinking keep an organization vital. A culture needs to be committed to ensure its employees, customers and outside-in thinking all have access to collaborate, infuse qualify ideas and value by actions, not just words.
So these are 5 principles that factor into work I know directly inspire emotional connections and meaningful organizations, so many only talk about as important. The answer reflects our sense of self as enlightened by our sense of others. Plus, it reveals how we build paths versus accepting walls. Success is no longer a “do what is expected” measure. It really requires a mix of bolder talents. The ones I see as most important are aligning our passions, values and needs of our ecosystem without a closed agenda. The more we share, the more we care. That can fuel any organization to earn ecosystem-wide regard aligned to their higher expectations and total transparency. Unity and Diversity are vitally interconnected with trust, inclusion, open mindedness and both personal and business relevance.
What’s stopping you? Time to get in flow.