(Cont'd)

Now, he doesn't mean that we should hire unskilled people. If attorneys, doctors or accountants are needed for a particular job by all means, hire them. Typically, however, organizations recruit people with the highest level of skill. You know, hire the best…the brightest. Your company probably prides itself on that. But is that really necessary? Or is it compensation because we aren't organized to deliver optimal results?

Suppose our organizations or departments were set up so meticulously, so systematically, that good people could be leveraged to produce extraordinary results. How can we deliver value to our customers with brilliant systems rather than people ?

I recognize that things are moving a warp-speed these days, and yet, there is opportunity in what Gerber has to say. I don't know about you, but the last couple of dotcom companies I worked in were moving so fast that they rarely wrote anything down. They rarely stopped between projects to debrief and identify learnings. They rarely established mechanisms to share success stories and information across geographies or departments. They didn't maximize their learning opportunities to leverage the mistakes and wins of the day for increased potential gain in the future.

How good is your organization at:

• Documenting processes and enhancements?
• Sharing great ideas across divisional/functional lines?
• Communicating vision and goals throughout the organization?
• Engaging the hearts of employees and harvesting their ideas for improvements?

Suppose you invested the time and energy to make an upgrade of just 5% in any of those areas? What might then be possible?