I was struck by a recent conversation I had with a senior executive at a large publicly-trade e-commerce company. This person, a friend, is an intelligent and rightly-skeptical sort whose professional success came not from the endless recitation of homilies or from spouting corporate orthodoxies; instead, he is who he is- he works hard, is intelligent, and treats people well. His differentiator is a rare commodity: clarity of purpose.
That was the thread that tied together all of his exuberant comments about his company- that the organization has clarity of purpose and at every moment, at every juncture knows what it wants to accomplish for its customers and itself. Every artifact build inside the company has to accrue to one or more of the immutable principles that form the foundation of the company and to which the employees have an abiding commitment.
[Read more...]
