Running a business is hard. You are constantly faced with difficult decisions and in the absence of a coherent set of values and without a clear understanding of correct business principles, you
have to deal with each decision on the fly. The result is often an unbalanced, incoherent, and sometimes contradictory response, that produces sub-optimal results and endless firefighting.
Our answer to this is A Principled Approach
A Principled Approach means 2 things:
01. to be principled means to act with integrity: that your actions are consistent with your values – the values you set out as those of your organisation and the values you yourself hold dear.
This is actually an end in itself, as being effective is not just about achieving results. Success feels empty if you don’t live with integrity . If you achieve what you want in life in the right way, then you will be truly proud of your achievements.
However, being moral on its own is not enough . you aren’t in business to lose money and it can sometimes seem that to be profitable you have to compromise your integrity, but this is a false dichotomy.
We firmly believe (and have experienced first-hand) that the values, you and your organisation hold, and the mission it’s striving to fulfil are not a barrier, but the route to sustainable profits.
If you want to keep great staff and motivate them, you have to treat them well. If you want to find and retain great clients, you have to meet their needs and exceed their expectations. Anything else is short-termism. and won’t serve your long term aims.
“Good leaders build products. Great leaders build cultures. Good leaders deliver results. Great leaders develop people. Good leaders have a vision. Great leaders have values. Good leaders are role models at work. Great leaders are role models in life.” Adam Grant
02. principles are fundamental truths that serve as the foundation for a system and set of behaviours. They are permanent, unchanging, and universal in nature.
Because of this they can be applied in many different contexts. When you need guidance to solve any given problem, you can check against a principle to see if your plan is in harmony with it or clashes against it.
In the 40 years of combined experience of starting, scaling and leading businesses, we have developed frameworks of practical wisdom; clear principles that can be applied in the real world; the right ways to work in all elements of business.
We don’t offer specific advice; we offer rules of thumb that you can check your ideas and actions against. Applicable to any business, they empower you to answer the questions which you are faced with yourself.
Having these clear principles means your decisions becomes coherent with the whole, instead of being dealt with in isolation, ensuring that the company’s behaviours, systems and practices are aligned with your business strategy.
A mission led, values based, principle centred approach, to drive sustainable business success
Read on here for an example of one of our principles and its application