APRIL 2011: OPINION PIECE
Building the high performance organisation
Organisations today are operating in an environment where change is relentless, competition is fierce and global, and customers are more demanding than ever before.
A tight global economy demands that they do more, faster and with fewer resources to work with. New technologies are extinguishing old business models at a bewildering rate while new markets and opportunities are constantly rising.
To succeed in this challenging environment, businesses need to transform themselves into ’high performance organisations’ (HPOs).
A HPO can be defined as an organisation that achieves financial and non-financial results that are better than those of its peer group over a period of at least five to 10 years.
It’s important to note that within this definition, there is an explicit recognition that HPOs consistently produce outstanding results across a wide range of criteria, not just financial.
Before we delve further into the qualities that set an HPO apart from its competitors, it is worth pointing out that the HPO is driven by teams and individuals who operate at a continuous, sustained level of high performance.
The competencies of the HPO
An HPO will excel in every element of its business, from the quality of its products and the satisfaction of its customers, through to its financial performance and the development of its human resources. We have identified eight key competencies that drive superior performance in an HPO.
The first is that of collaborative organisational design - in other words, an organisational structure that promotes sharing of information and best practices across functional areas and business units. There is a flat structure and a spirit of cooperation in the HPO that is often missing in businesses that perform poorly.
Secondly, an HPO will have a clear and compelling strategy that charts a path for its future and that takes into account both the organisation’s internal strengths and the demands of the external environment. It will be ambitious, but achievable, and it will create excitement for, and a common understanding of, the organisation’s direction.
The third characteristic of the HPO is its simple, efficient and innovative business processes. These range from the fair and intelligent reward structure used to motivate staff, through to the ways the HPO innovates products, processes and services. There will be a focus on measuring and improving these processes at all levels - with financial and non-financial metrics being taken into account.
Fourthly, it will have flexible and user friendly technology in place.
Perhaps one of the most important competencies is that of transformational leadership. The senior leaders of the business must be confident and humble visionaries with the ability to build relationships of trust with people on all levels. Leaders in HPOs are decisive, have integrity, and inspire and grow new leaders from within. They are catalysts for change and growth.
Sixthly, HPOs are learning organisations that hire people who are keen to grow and stretch themselves, and then provides them with the opportunities to do so.
A related competence is an empowering culture that gives people freedom to decide and act within the context of the HPO’s strong and meaningful core values.
Finally, an HPO is stakeholder oriented. It continuously strives to enhance value for employees, shareholders, customers, and communities where it does business.
High-performance teams and individuals
Organisations also need to have a clear idea of what they will regard as high performance from their individual employees and teams. These are the building blocks for HPOs.
High performance individuals will exhibit competencies such as personal leadership, the ability to forge strong interpersonal relationships, a focus on results, excellent communication skills, a good service ethic and the ability to think both creatively and conceptually.
High performance teams will have strong leadership in place, and will be guided by robust and efficient processes. They will be customer-focused, made up of people in relationships of mutual trust and respect, and be completely engaged with the work they do every day.
Once you understand the core elements that make up an HPO, you begin to understand the importance of looking at performance in a holistic manner. A holistic approach is required to unlock high performance at an individual, team and organisational level.
The journey towards becoming an HPO starts out with an evaluation of the organisation’s competencies - a diagnosis of its critical business issues, challenges and enablers.
The next step is to design a ’performance process’ that focuses on high-impact improvements to the eight competencies outlined earlier. From here, one can build and execute the performance process, and then measure its impact against one’s key performance indicators.
Strategies to improve team and individual performance will underpin a lot of the work an organisation will do towards becoming an HPO. An HPO invests a great deal of effort on improving working conditions and development opportunities for its workforce.
This transcends formal or workshop-based training and includes a number of components described as a performance process.
The performance process supports performance of teams and individuals by preparing them, their managers and the climate for change. It drives learning throughout the organisation using both formal and informal mechanisms such as mentoring, coaching, on-the-job training and classroom learning.
It also weaves teams and individuals into collaborative networks linked to knowledge resources and tools for sharing information. In addition, a performance process supports teams and employees back in the workplace by equipping their line managers to coach them and by providing them with tools to facilitate easy application of new skills, tools and knowledge. Finally, it measures their performance to identify opportunities for further improvement
Conclusion
Building a HPO should be done using best practice and experience garnered from international trends. Performance improvement needs to be considered and driven in a holistic manner at the individual, team and organisation levels. The rewards of transforming into an HPO are significant: HPOs enjoy revenue growth between 4% to 16% higher than their competitors and profitability between 14 to 44% higher. Their returns on assets, equity, investment and sales may also be 25% higher than those of their rivals.
SEPTEMBER 2010
CIDAlearning launches with fresh new name and approach as The Performance Hub
CIDAlearning, one of South Africa’s leading providers of customised training and performance solutions, has rebranded under the name of The Performance Hub with effect 1 September 2010.
The organisation has come to market with a fresh name and approach in recognition of the way that its business has changed over the decade since it launched. CIDAlearning started out by providing a menu of soft-skill workshops and gradually evolved into an organisation that helps its clients enhance performance across individuals, teams and entire organisations.
Today, The Performance Hub is a respected provider of customised performance solutions that are crafted through a unique diagnostics process that uncovers the critical performance challenges faced by its clients.
"We are relaunching our business with a value proposition that reflects our identity as an organisation that provides powerful and innovative performance solutions to progressive companies implementing strategies to achieve high performance,” says Elusha Jansen, CEO of The Performance Hub. “The solutions we offer equip our clients with strategies and tools for enhanced performance, as working within this challenging global economy requires performance that is unprecedented.”
The Performance Hub offers performance solutions that include the use of progressive alternatives to the traditional training and learning methods, such as coaching, organisational development, planned change consultation and interventions, facilitated planning sessions and large group processes to its clients. These solutions are custom-designed with outcomes specifically tailored to the meet the performance needs of each client’s business.
"Our philosophy towards mobilising high performance has evolved, aligning with best practice. The Performance Hub is focussed on driving organisational, team and individual high performance, with learning viewed as only one aspect of an effective performance process," Jansen says. "We have conceptualised a systemic and holistic performance ecology, with a number of different components that enable sustainable high performance.”
The Performance Hub is differentiated by its Performance Architecture, which frames high performance at an individual, team and organisational level. This Architecture is used to diagnose the competencies required to drive high performance across all levels of the client’s business and allows The Performance Hub to architect solutions that enhance performance in a sustainable manner.
Says Jansen: “Although we have a new brand identity, we will remain value centred and powered by innovation and creativity, consistently placing our clients at the heart of the performance conversation.”
