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Is it still possible for companies to still thrive despite the pandemic?

If we go by recent reports on global and local brands that have done well despite COVID-19, the answer is a resounding “yes”.

Last August 25, 2021 the Philippine Society for Talent Development (PSTD) through its Presidents Series on Course & Conversations provided 34 participants from various companies and organizations with a game-changing, 2-hour learning session on a critical ingredient for companies to thrive amidst this global crisis.

Using three curated videos, easy to follow diagrams and charts, and real-life cases of companies that consistently got the job done, Ms. Lirio Mapa, the Vice-President of the Center for Leadership and Change (CLCI), gave an instructive overview of 4DX – “a simple, repeatable, and proven formula for executing your most important strategic priorities despite professional distractions.” Also known as the 4 Disciplines of Execution, 4DX consists of disciplines which address the challenges that contribute to the execution gap (i.e., the gap between strategy and results).

To address the challenge of teams having too many goals and not knowing which to prioritize, the first discipline focuses on the Wildly Important Goal (WIG). This is the goal which leads to significant consequences such as meeting key stakeholder expectations. In the case of a sales organization, this could mean increasing sales from Php 1M to 1.4M by December 31. The key is not to have 8 to 10 goals but rather to clarify the 1 goal that is most important.

To deal with the problem of teams working on tasks and activities that do not really contribute to the WIG, the second discipline acts on Lead Measures. A lead measure is a task or an activity that directly influences the lag measure or the result. Ms. Mapa gave the example of losing weight during the pandemic. Your desired weight is the lag measure while the activities that would lead to it such as watching what you eat and exercising daily are the lead measures. To go back to the example above, to achieve the Php 1.4M sales target, each sales officer calls on say, 10 target prospects daily via Viber, Zoom and the like.

To handle the challenge of teams who couldn’t care less about the WIG, the third discipline keeps a Compelling Scoreboard. Much like our favorite basketball team, our teammates give their best when they see at any given time how their actions contribute to the WIG. To do this, CLCI in partnership with FranklinCovey US, now offers the 4DX app. This allows your team to design your own scoreboard or 4DX dashboard online. Just like the car dashboard, this tool provides feedback in real time. In the case of the example above, your dashboard can tell you the number of clients contacted for the day (lead measure) and its impact on the day’s sales (lag measure).

Lastly, to cope with the problem of teams not following through, the fourth discipline creates a Cadence of Accountability. Using our example above, this means meeting with your team weekly to answer 3 questions: (1) Where is the team in terms of lead and lag measures; (2) What is the status of everyone’s commitment? and (3) What does each member commit to do this week?