"An organization will have a high spirit of performance if it is consistently directed toward opportunity rather than toward problems.
It will have the thrill of excitement, a sense of challenge, and the satisfaction of achievement if it's energies are put where the results are, and that means on the opportunities.
Of course, problems can not be neglected. But the problem-focused organization is an organization on the defensive. It is an organization that feels it has performed well if things do not get worse.
A management that wants to create and maintain the spirit of achievement therefore stresses opportunity. But it will also demand that opportunities be converted into results."
Peter F. Drucker
It's an enduring truth: A successful organization is opportunity-focused not problem-focused.
Resources, to produce results, must be allocated to opportunities rather than problems. This is one of Peter F. Drucker's most important success principles.
And he wove this principle into many of the practices that he prescribed for sustained success.
A Sad But True Observation
Many executives prefer to "put out fires" rather than focus on opportunities. Many of the "fires" they so superbly extinguish usually boils down to problems they've created. This keeps them busy but not necessarily very productive.
Drucker, in Adventures Of A Bystander, tells us how the legendary chairman of General Motors, Alfred D. Sloan, was very aware of this truism.
" Decisions on people usually provoked heated debate in the GM executive committee.
Once, the whole GM committee seemed to be agreed on one candidate for president of an operating division, 'who had handled this crisis superbly, solved that problem beautifully and quenched yonder fire with great aplomb.'
Mr. Sloan, finally, broke in. " 'A very impressive record your Mr. Smith has, he said, 'but do explain to me how he gets into all these crises he then so brilliantly surmounts? ' Nothing more was ever heard of Mr. Smith. "
Needed: Opportunity Meetings
People see what is presented to them; what is not presented tends to be overlooked.
Said Drucker: "Most meetings discuss " problems "--especially in the areas where performance falls below expectations--which means that managers tend not to see the opportunities. They're simply not being presented with them. "
Drucker said again and again: "Of course, problems have to be paid attention to, taken seriously, and tackled... But if they are the only thing that is being discussed, opportunities will die of neglect."
Now… Many organizations have two meetings. One meeting to discuss and solve problems. Another meeting to identify and focus on opportunities.
You should integrating the "opportunity meeting" best practice into your management practices. It works wonders.
"Assigning First-Rate Resources to First-Rate Opportunities"
"First-class people most always be allocated to major opportunities, to the areas of greatest possible return for each unit of effort.
And first-class opportunities most always be staffed with people of superior ability and performance."
Drucker could not have been more emphatic: One never assigns first-class people to anything but major opportunities.
Yet this does not happen in many organizations because they are oriented toward "feeding the problems and starving the opportunities." In short, they're not really opportunity-focused. They only talk about it but don't do it.
All one can get by "problem solving" is damage containment. Only opportunities produce results and growth.
It takes years to incorporate this Drucker-inspired thinking into your organization's DNA.
Most decidedly, you must start asking the following set of Drucker questions:
1. Who are your best-performing people?
2. What are they assigned to?
Almost without exception, said Drucker, "the performers are assigned to problems––to the old business that is sinking faster than had been forecast; to the old product that is being outflanked by a competitor's new offering; to the old technology––for example, analog switches, when the market has already switched to digital."
Drucker always stressed the question: "Who takes care of the opportunities?" Almost invariably, he observed, the opportunities are left to fend for themselves. Not good.
Another Drucker Practice for Identifying and Capitalizing on Opportunities
"Draw up a list,he said, "of the opportunities facing the business and make sure each is adequately staffed (and adequately supported). Only then should you draw up a list of the problems and worry about staffing them."
Drucker gave the case of General Electric under the leadership of Jack Welsh. Welsh decided to get rid of all businesses––even profitable ones––that did not offer long-range growth and the opportunity for the company to be number 1 or number 2 in the global marketplace.
And then GE placed its best performing people in the opportunity businesses, and made them into incredible successes Welsh made GE into an opportunity-focused organization with this and other practices based on the teachings of Drucker.
In Conclusion
Becoming opportunity focused requires work and thinking. It requires more than slogans. It requires practices that can be practiced.
Hopefully, this article will get you started in thinking how you can convert your organization's mindset into becoming truly opportunity-focused. In future Drucker Perspective articles we will reveal many other opportunity-focused practices that have transformed organizations.
And opportunities are actually every bit as difficult and demanding as the real and created problems are.