Line of sight is one of those terms that people toss off -- everyone nods sagely, and the conversation moves on. It's a shame because employees are eager to find out how their work contributes to the company's strategy. In fact, companies where employees know their line of sight do better financially.
After all, don't we promise employees a clear line of sight when we ask them to write their objectives? Who wouldn't wonder "why" after being asked to analyze work outcomes and then select those that have the greatest impact? We can guess that most employees have made up their own version of how their job contributes to the company. And those who haven't probably feel like they have a job to do which their supervisor oversees, and that's enough.
But is this lack of clarity really good enough? Wouldn't you rather have a company that's more cohesive around its Mission? I have been in companies that work hard on line of sight and the level of discussion around strategy and product development is impressive.
Do you need to create a full-on campaign to improve? You'll have the greatest impact if you can align senior management around the issue, so that there is a set of clear messages that are discussed first with managers, and then with employees. But not everyone can succeed at this level. So, what's an alternative?
Make a discussion about line of sight a regular part of team discussions throughout the company two or three times a year. If everyone is doing it, there will inevitably be discussions among employees that can ignite further interest.
Here's an easy group technique that can be incorporated into most any meeting:
- Choose one of the team's goals and ask everyone to write down how it contributes to the business strategy.
- Have the team leader start by describing why this discussion is important.
- Then the team leader starts by sharing her/his notes, capturing them on a board. It's important to have the team leader go first to model how important the topic is, and to show how she/he is adapting to open sharing.
- Go around the group, asking each person to share her/his thoughts and write them on the board
- Provide feedback on what has been brought out. Expand where necessary and make suggestions about how to increase insight.
- Consider discussing more team goals, if time allows.
- Suggest that each one in the meeting think about how the discussion links with her/his own objectives, to see if that leads to further questions or discussion.
Over time, these discussions will help employees see their role in the bigger picture. Managers will also learn where to put additional effort into clarifying the team's and/or the company's business priorities. The outcomes of these discussions can inevitably lead to improved performance -- which is dead center in Comp's line of sight, isn't it?
Margaret O'Hanlon brings deep expertise to discussions on employee pay, performance management, career development and communications at the Café. Her firm, re:Think Consulting, provides market pay information and designs base salary structures, incentive plans, career paths and their implementation plans. Earlier, she was a Principal at Willis Towers Watson. A former Board member for the Bay Area Compensation Association (BACA), Margaret coauthored the popular eBook, Everything You Do (in Compensation) Is Communications, a toolkit that all practitioners can find at everythingiscommunication.com.
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