Successful organizations rely on process to point the way to greater efficiencies or continued improvement – but at what point does that reliance on process begin to strangle the culture and maybe even hurt the business?  In working to uncover your EVP, are you finding that your brand is suffering because of the company’s over-reliance on process and procedure?

Just Another Cog in the Machine

Every company should value and strive for continuous improvement.  At the point where your employees begin to feel removed from the results and their leadership team begin to treat KPI’s as targets, you could be hurting your brand.  As Bernard Marr warns in his post on Linked In, KPI’s can become toxic.  He cautions companies against the “mindless chasing of numbers.”  When this begins to happen, your leaders become focused on short-term measurements and begin to manage to the numbers, instead of to overall goals.  The organization may begin to reward management, rather than leadership. Instead of leading to further improvement, teams can begin to lose productivity.  Employees begin to feel completely replaceable, because they are treated as measurements, rather than individuals.  It is difficult to develop a strong EVP if your employees feel like an interchangeable cog in the machine.

Meetings about Meetings?

Responsibility without true authority is another way to frustrate employees.  Having someone accountable for a result, but requiring multiple stakeholders to buy in and sign off before any action can be taken toward that result is not empowering, it is a sign of mistrust, according to author Lisa Bodell.  She references a Boston Consulting Group study, finding that “over the past fifteen years, the amount of procedures, vertical layers, interface structures, coordination bodies, and decision approvals needed…has increased by anywhere from 50 percent to 350 percent.”  In large organization, managers can spend up to 60% of their time in coordination meetings.

When employees move from meeting to meeting, back to back, without any time to action a growing list of to-do’s, they quickly begin to feel overwhelmed.  The environment becomes full of very “busy”, unproductive, people who don’t have the time to accomplish what they need to.

A collaborative environment can be a source of engagement; a way for employees to share ideas, benefit from each other’s diverse experience and perspective.  If your teams are at a point where every team member is in every meeting and still no-one seems ultimately accountable for acting, it’s a problem.

It’s Hard to Measure “Innovation”

As a side effect of process-oriented organizations is the concern that they lose the ability to adapt or to innovate.  As companies grow and the need to become more standardized and more scalable takes over, there is less and less time set aside to innovate.  The emphasis on measurement can lead to short-term results-focus and the down-playing of the importance of individual contributions.  Innovation doesn’t show immediate value, and it’s difficult to put a process around “be creative” because it’s not easily attached to a KPI.

There is a danger that companies will begin look at opportunities through internal lenses rather than starting with customers’ needs and problems.  Instead of looking for a way to make something happen, the investigation becomes about how easily it will fit in with this departmental procedure or that corporate process.  It can easily frustrate employees who begin to feel that it is impossible to impact the organization in any real way and result in a disengaged workforce.

Don’t get us wrong, to be efficient, you need standard operating procedures.  It is important for engagement that everyone understands what behaviours are expected from them and what results they are accountable for.  Well-run organizations have a tremendous EVP; but be wary of turning your KPI’s into goals – instead of indicators along the way.  Help your leaders understand how to manage the metrics but inspire and empower their people.  Don’t lose sight of the need to motivate individuals and keep them connected to big picture goals.  Engaged employees will be the best brand ambassadors.