Situation: Aligning employees with a new vision
As part of a major strategic overhaul, a leading international corporation needed to engage its employees and partners in its vision for the future. The vision represented a dramatic shift from the past and required significant change in how key stakeholders worked, how they led and how they made decisions. Without strong awareness, understanding and enthusiastic involvement, the strategy—and the business itself—could not succeed.
Our Strategic Approach
To move the company’s leaders and employees from awareness of the new vision to personal responsibility for the company’s success, we:
- Crafted simple, yet powerful positioning statement and messaging that clearly and compellingly summarized the company’s vision
- Organized the company’s initiatives under three strategic imperatives, which were easy for employees at all levels to understand and embrace
- Developed a communications strategy leaders at all levels used to create ownership of the vision among their teams, including:
- Ongoing strategic Board communications
- Annual, week-long meeting of senior-level management, where leaders refresh the vision and communicate updated strategic imperatives
- Leader Guides that help cascade the vision and strategies throughout the organization in ways that are relevant to various levels and business units
- Created a quarterly employee “town hall” meeting, during which senior management discussed strategic progress and celebrated wins and communicated next steps.
- Created Leader Guides that drove conversations about strategic initiatives, projects and necessary actions down to the front-line level
Results
- The company saw a 25 percent jump in earnings 18 months after the program’s launch.
- 93 percent of corporate employees said they were committed to the company’s goals.
- 95 percent said they understood how their work contributed to the company’s strategic priorities.
- Eight years later, the company continues to use both the vision statement and the strategic platform we created.