It’s Never “Just Semantics”

It’s Never “Just Semantics”

“Can we just move on? It’s just semantics,” moaned the CEO, weary of listening to his team grappling to pinpoint the right words to craft their organisation’s mission statement.

I hear the “It’s just semantics” line often in the strategy work I facilitate, typically centred around a 2 or 3-day offsite “advance” in which the clock-watchers worry that time is ticking and that we won’t get to the important stuff if we stay stuck on a word or two. This is where I have to dig deep into my decades of facilitation experience and make a judgement call – wordsmith later or ventilate the choice of words awhile longer? It is a particular challenge when “flavour of the month” words or phrases are thrown out. For then I know that I HAVE to push the team to dig deep and find the true meaning for their organisation. Without this, they will end up with a vacuous statement that provides no strategic direction, no differentiation vis a vis their competitors, and no indication of who they uniquely are and the value they provide. Here a five phrases that “get my goat”:

Best practice:

• Best practices are those things that have been done over time that consistently manifest excellent results. But consider this: best practices were what the leading organisations started doing MANY YEARS AGO that have made them excel! They applied to a specific time and context. Are they still applicable? Are they relevant? Adopting “best practice” means you are a follower, not a leader in your industry. Is that what you want to be? Chances are, whilst you are following “best practice”, the market leader is already creating new best practices.

Centre of Excellence:

• This has become a buzzword in education and in organisations that are trying to position themselves as learning, innovative cultures. Think of it though – a centre is one part of a whole – do you want just one part of your organisation or system to be excellent, or do you want excellence coursing through all the nooks and crannies of your organisation? You decide … but first be clear on what you mean.

Employer of Choice:

• Because I do so much work with the Balanced Scorecard, this one comes up a lot. “We want to be Employer of Choice” – do you need to be employer of choice for everyone? Or just for the few, talented, right and perfect people that fit your organisation’s needs? Being “Employer of Choice” is a nice award, but does it really contribute to, and meaningfully define your strategy?

World Class:

• Jamaican athletes are widely acknowledged to be “world class” (they certainly have the medals to prove it!) … but that’s only in sprinting and is measured objectively in competitions like the Olympics and World Championships, in which all the nations of the world compete. Inspired by their performances, we have brought the phrase “world class” into our business lexicon. But what does this mean for your organisation? Do you want to be the best in the world? Which world? And how will that be measured?

Employee Engagement:

• From satisfaction and engagement – this is the latest “in word” for getting people involved and inspired and loving the work they do. When I hear “engagement” though, I hark back to the term in the marriage context – both speak to commitment, but at different levels. Go back to basics – what are the relationships and commensurate behaviours and emotional bonds that you desire your people to have?

Failure to think buzz phrases such as these might get you something like this:

“Our mission is to be a world class Centre of Excellence, consistently displaying best practices, being the Employer of Choice, with a high level of employee engagement”

Is that what you want? Is that who you, and only you, really are? If not, spend the time to delve deeply into what you mean for your organisation. Whenever you hear or speak these buzzwords and phrases, stop and ask: “What do we really mean?” Try rephrasing the sentence without the word and/or phrase and see what emerges (a tip …. Keep your Thesaurus handy!)

Remember: strategy is not about buzzwords – it involves deep questioning because words do matter.