In today’s fast-paced business environment, building capacity within teams is paramount to achieving sustainable growth and success. Capacity can be viewed as a function of three critical components: expertise, resources, and engagement. Together, these elements form the bedrock of a robust and resilient organization.
The Goal: Automation and Efficiency
The ultimate goal should be creating systems that make processes automatic or semi-automatic, enhancing the organization’s capacity and efficiency. This is often overlooked, especially in an era of instant communication. Ensuring robust strategy and systems are developed is a critical step in building leadership and expertise and achieving long-term success.
1. Expertise: The Foundation of Capacity
The first step in building capacity is ensuring that we have individuals who possess the necessary expertise to understand and address complex problems. This involves identifying what skills are needed and bringing in the right talent to meet those needs. It’s not just about hiring experts; it’s about having internal champions who can recognize the level of expertise required and can drive the process of simplifying and solving problems.
2. Resources: Importance of Being Strategic
Resources are the enablers that allow expertise to flourish. Allocating resources effectively can act as a catalyst for growth. This means allocating the right tools and appropriate resources based on availability and effectiveness and understanding the resource allocation trade-offs. In other words, what drives the marginal gains and improves the probability of success? Resources should always be aligned with the organization’s strategic goals. The team needs to know and understand the strategic objectives and goals. Ultimately, the aim should be to create systems and procedures that simplify problem-solving and make processes accessible and replicable for everyone in the organization.
3. Engagement: The Cultural Glue
Engagement is often the most misunderstood element in building team capacity. Attitudes I have encountered suggest that problems can be contracted away. In other words, “just contract it.” In my experience, I have found the exact opposite. Contractors are a resource; they are not the company nor are they management. The strategic goals, owner’s representation, and due diligence cannot be contracted out.
A culture that fosters engagement can significantly enhance individual and team performance. Studies have shown that environments can impact cognitive abilities, affecting IQ scores by as much as 15 points. Creating a supportive and engaging culture is essential, and buy-in is important. Without buy-in from stakeholders, moving projects along and having individuals step in and forecast challenges becomes difficult at best. Building a strong culture requires a shared vision, a framework that supports collaboration, and ensuring individuals have the tools and authority to matter in achieving success.
Cheat Sheet for Designing Systems for Capacity and Efficiency
As companies face new challenges, dedicating resources to build capacity should be a strategic priority. The steps to achieving this can be summarized by three fundamental elements:
- Understanding the Problem: Internal experts must have a deep understanding of the challenges to identify the required expertise.
- Simplifying the Problem: Break down the problem into manageable steps and develop procedures that make future problem-solving straightforward.
- Training and Development: Ensure that these procedures can be learned and implemented by others within the organization.
Investing in Expertise
All businesses ultimately are agents of the owners or shareholders. As such, goodwill and value are created by the competitive advantage the organization can build. Ultimately, that competitive advantage is driven by the expertise of the business and the intangible skill sets and systems that would be challenging for others to replicate.
Shareholders are ultimately investing in the organization’s expertise. It’s important to convey how the organization will strengthen over time, understand metrics, and demonstrate continuous improvement. The focus should always be on solving issues effectively the first time, ensuring that the organization becomes more capable and efficient with each challenge.
By prioritizing expertise, resources, and engagement, we can build a resilient organization capable of thriving in any environment. Investing in these areas not only enhances capacity and efficiency but also ensures long-term success and value creation for shareholders. This approach solidifies a company’s position in the industry and drives sustainable growth.