Want To Break The Status Quo In An Organization? Try Using A Benchmark Assessment

In this week’s issue, I’ll share how I’ve used benchmark assessments in multiple roles to drive professional humility and unlock a passion for breaking through the status quo.

Sometimes, we overestimate how well we’re performing relative to the external environment, thus I’ll share how benchmarks have helped level-set teams I have worked on.

By using external benchmarks, you’ll allow yourself to remain objective while leveraging an external view to provide a lens as to what is possible with your teams.

The challenge is that sometimes we have stayed too long in our bubble, we forget that being stationary is the same as falling backward because others are moving forward.

We need to aspire to where we can be which means leaving where we are.

Here are 3 steps you can take to help your team break through the status quo while building a thirst for improving from where it is.

Step 1: Set a goal to get to world-class processes explicitly

Begin with the end in mind is a commonly used phrase that is appropriate here.

I would take that a little further by stating leaders need to begin by explicitly sharing that end with their teams. That end should be a desire to build a world-class operation. It may feel awkward to state that publicly, and you may not know what that looks like in the beginning but talking about it with your team will help them get thinking about what good will look like in the future.

Sometimes, being world class may be a future too unrealistic and in that case, I’d substitute the phase by talking about being industry-leading instead. In either case, you have got to own wanting to be the best possible operation in your space and letting your team know that is the journey you will be actively on with them.

Step 2: Get an external benchmark with maturity scales

An external benchmark with maturity scales helps you get to world-class in a deliberate and targeted way.

They usually will have high-level process step descriptions laid out

• Use a simple scale anywhere from 0 as a starting point.

  • 0 would be a rating for a step not started or defined but not being followed.

  • the highest rating would be a process step operating at a world-class level.

  • Here’s an example below

  

  Example Maturity Assessment

As you see above, you can define key steps in your operation or process and work to outline what the maturity level would look like from nothing to being world-class. One way to also get access to maturity assessments is to ask your larger customers or larger suppliers or auditing or consulting companies if they have relevant maturity-based assessments that they can share to drive your transformation.

Building your maturity scales is like building your championship playbook for your team

Step 3: Meet with your team to assess your processes. Do it with them

It’s been said, “Go slow to go fast”. Maturity assessments are one of the areas where this saying is really relevant.

In most teams, this will be the first time they have looked at their process through an external lens. The experience is likely to have a humbling effect and you will need to help them navigate that feeling of inadequacy. In the times, I’ve used it, I work to make a few points to bring team members along before we get into it.

• Our organization has succeeded because of all the work they’ve done.

• The assessment helps us to build on our historic success

• The assessment is about our process not our people

• The assessment gives us a roadmap for what is possible

• Going through that journey will create new opportunities and capabilities for each of us.

Most importantly, we make time together to assess ourselves using those benchmark questions and that’s when magic happens. I’ve found that going through it as a team allows us to see the same things and creates a foundation for transformational change moving forward.

(I’ve written about on this link https://msr.beehiiv.com/p/10-steps-building-championship-level-processes-nengikrukrubo)

Thanks for reading. Have a great week!

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