As many of you know, Integris is a long-term devotee of Gino Wickman’s “Traction.” This Entrepreneurial Operating System (“EOS”) helps you predict the 5 most common frustrations every entrepreneur and organization are bound to face:
- A lack of control over your time, the market or your company.
- Frustration with your people, whether that’s your employees, customers or partners. They don’t seem to listen to you or understand your frustrations.
- Not enough profit.
- Hitting the ceiling on your growth; no matter what you do, you can’t get to the next level
- Nothing is working. You’ve tried so many new strategies that your staff is numb to new initiatives.
EOS identifies six key Components of any organization – Vision, People, Data, Issues, Process and Traction. Each is part of a system you can use to turn your business around, break through to the next level, and finally get control of your business AKA get traction. This month we will focusing on the People component for two reasons; we love our employees and we’ve been able to retain and develop strong employees by moving them around based on data gathered by following the Traction framework.
This idea is both simple and incredibly hard. Great leaders surround themselves with great people and make sure that they have the right people for the right jobs. The right people share your company’s core values and would thrive in your culture. Once you’re confident you have selected the right people, it’s important to get them in the right seats. That means all of your people are operating according to their unique abilities and those abilities are clearly in line with their roles and responsibilities.
The EOS has some strong opinions about how the main roles in your organization should be structured. First, there are 3 main functions in your business – (1) sales and marketing, (2) operations, and (3) finance and administration. Each of those functions must be strong.
Second, in any business there needs to be somebody who integrates the major functions of the business. This, not surprisingly, is called an Integrator. They have the unique ability to run the business and manage the day-to-day issues.
Third, in most entrepreneur-run organization, there is a final role of Visionary. This is usually the founder of the company. They are very creative, have a lot of ideas and solve big problems.
When a company is small, it’s ok to have the same people in more than one of the above roles, but typically a company doesn’t break through to the next level until they find people who are uniquely suited for sales, marketing, operations, finance and administration
They are uniquely suited for the each of the roles if they Get It, Want It, and have the Capacity to do it. This is known as the GWC filter and it’s critical that all three of those criteria are met.
Integris CEO Hamish Davidson is our Visionary and has done a tremendous job of hiring the right people to implement his ideas. One example is Operations Director Matt Galloway who plays the role of Integrator. Hired in August of 2017, Matt has embraced the “Traction” concepts and has been working to improve role clarity and ensure that the vast talents of our staff are best utilized. This might mean somebody gets moved from procurement to the service desk. Or someone in professional services automation management might also take on a quality control role overseeing procurement because they are very detailed oriented and already knee deep in the system that manages all order fulfillment and timelines. By aligning our employees’ skills, personal goals, talents and interests with Integris’s company goals, we are continuing to build a strong, collaborative workforce that translates to improved efficiency and quality of the customer experience in all aspects. We love talking about “Traction” and welcome any inquires.
