The second P that is at the core of the P.O.P.S. system is people. In any organization cashflow is like blood. You need to have it and it needs to keep flowing! If it stops flowing or your system springs a leak you will lose your blood and your life rather quickly! Profit is like oxygen, you can live without it for brief periods of time if you need to, but if that gets extended too long it will create irreparable harm if not complete death. I see people as the brain, heart and soul of the organization. It is the people that keeps cash flowing and oxygen moving through the system. People are also responsible for the growth of the organization. The success and ultimate potential of the organization is directly correlated to the people driving it forward. This is true for all people in the organization and specifically poignant for the leadership.
When I started this blog I thought I would end up writing a lot about business, farming, cows and likely some baseball (don’t worry this is all coming!). But so far most of the topics have been about personal growth and development. That hasn’t exactly been by design but as I was thinking about topics to write about I wanted to hit on the most impactful first and for me that has been the focus on my own personal growth and development.
A couple of years ago we were doing a deep dive on how Kerpan Farms could move forward and we brainstormed a lot of options, many of them viable; some of them exciting. We all looked at the paper with a multitude of options and a wise man among us said “there are a lot of options here to choose from, but one thing for certain, whichever direction Kerpan Farms chooses to go, it will require a higher level of Josh” (I put that in quotes and have certainly butchered the precise and eloquent tone that was actually used but it serves the purpose.) That struck me like a lightning bolt! It wasn’t meant as a criticism of who I was at that time it was simply an observation that I was going to have to lead the growth instead of trying to push us forward from the rear. I have really focused on growing my personal skills and abilities since then so that I can lead my family and businesses towards goals that I wasn’t capable of achieving not that long ago. Thank you John.
To circle back to the analogy of the body imagine that you wanted to run a marathon so you decided to go out one day and try…..you likely wouldn’t get very far before your body quit or your heart gave out! It’s not because you aren’t capable of running the marathon but your heart isn’t in condition to do that…….yet. Or if you want to become a lawyer. You(unless you’re a lawyer) and I(certainly I) likely don’t have the skills necessary to step into that role tomorrow, but with time and growth of the necessary abilities it’s certainly possible.
I expect there will be many more blogs on personal growth topics but we won’t go further down that road here. I simply wanted to illustrate the importance of people to the success of any organization and the correlation between leadership and the growth potential of the organization. So often people are the bottleneck that stifles forward momentum and we can eliminate that bottleneck by growing ourselves to greater levels of competency.
This is why it’s critical to bring Right Fit people into your organization. That means they are the right person; they match your core values and principles. It also means they are in the right place, meaning they have the competency and desire to handle the position in your organization. We recruit, retain, reward and replace (4R's) based on alignment with our core values. If you are the right person then we will move heaven and earth to try and find you the right place in our organization. As we discussed in the article on defining your Purpose, defining your core values and principles is so critical to the formation of your team of collaborators. It will ultimately determine the success and potential of your organization……it’s kind of a big deal!
We have been blessed to have many great people help in building our business to what it has become and we have a strong and growing team which makes me incredibly excited for the future. My main focus is to ensure I am not the bottleneck that stifles growth and that I am capable of leading us into the future to create greater value and serve God’s creation. Wish me luck!
Thanks for reading, as always if you find this helpful please share! God Bless.
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