The Four Cs of a Legacy Culture

We have noticed, in our ten years of work with our clients, that there are some very specific keys to their ongoing success. We refer to these as the Four Cs of a Legacy Culture. Every organization struggles with these and, from time to time, will get all four of these factors working for them at the same time. The more often these four are present simultaneously, the more time the organization operates in a high performance zone.

The first C is Commitment. When everyone on the team is 100% committed to most important goals of the organization, the chances of achieving those goals increases exponentially. Failure to commit, by even one member of the team puts the team in jeopardy of not having the energy to achieve the goal. For a leader, being able to generate real commitments from your team is your most important job. But, how do you get that strong of a commitment from everyone on your team? That’s where the other three Cs come in.

The second C is Communication. Communication is so important and it is too often misunderstood. Many think it’s about getting the message out but that is only a small part of the communication puzzle. For your message to be heard, received, understod, and accepted requires so much more than getting the message out. The number one component of good communication is not speaking, it’s listening. The number two component of communication is to know the people who are part of the communication group. How do they prefer to be communicated to? How do they hear things? How do they process information? Are the quick to respond or do they need time to reflect? The Legacy Leader takes the time to engage, fully, in the process of communication.

The third C is Consistency. How many times do organizations start initiatives only to give up on them after a few months? Why does this happen? One reason is a lack of consistency. In the heat of the daily tasks and the frequent emergencies that crop up, the easiest thing to set aside is that new initiative. So a meeting is missed. A deadline is not met. And after a few of these incidents, the new initiative just fades away. Staff acquires a an “and this too shall pass” attitude resulting in future initiatves fizzling out as well. By creating a consistent check in, that is no more than 30 minutes in length, where every member of the team briefly informs the team as to their progress and actions to be taken next week, the initiatve is kept alive and in everyone’s minds. That consistent accountability act never lets the initiative die. If everyone knows that at the same time, on the same day, every week they will have to report on progress and declare actions for the coming week, the commitment is renewed.

The last C is Compassion. One of the biggest obstacles to success is lack of focus. One of the biggest contributors to breaks in focus is what’s going on in our lives. If a team member is not feeling well, or has difficulties at home, or has loved ones with issues, it is hard for them to zero in on what needs to be done. Too many managers of people want to tell them to leave their personal lives at home but that is almost impossible and is not worth the energy it takes to make that happen. A compassionate leader understands that work is best done by whole people and that those that are hurting will be less than fully capable. In addition, our team members will remember that we were compassionate and they will give even greater efforts when they have had a chance to deal with whatever it was that threw them off their game.

There is so much more that can be said about each of these but I will leave it at this for now. I will revisit each of these in future blog posts. A full post can be used to explore more detail about each of the four Cs. My next post will dig deeper into commitment.