Page 290 - Performance Leadership

Closing Thoughts • 279

level agreement. Would that work in our personal lives? Will we live
happily ever after with our spouse or partner if we have clear targets
and objectives as to whose task it is to clean out the dishwasher, do the
laundry, clean the bathroom, take out the garbage, sweep the driveway,
and paint the woodwork once in a while? Will we have a better rela-
tionship if we outsource all that work? I like to think it doesn’t work
that way. Granted, it does work the other way around. If there is no
agreement as to who does which household tasks, it becomes a con-
stant source of annoyance.
A happy relationship allows both partners to be interdependent,
where each of the partners respects the other’s values and views, but
where both partners choose to share those with each other. In a happy
relationship each of the partners is balanced and chooses to be aligned
with the other. You do that by discussing your day over dinner or your
dreams about the future while drinking a nice glass of wine in front of
the fireplace. It’s about sharing feelings and querying your partner
about his or her emotions, trying to help each other to build a clear
picture about yourself, your partner, and your relationship. We provide
feedback to keep each other on a straight path; we honestly and deeply
enjoy cleaning the courtyard or driveway because our partner will say
“thank you” and smile. We give to get. The result is a mutually bene-
ficial relationship. We add value to the relationship, instead of extract-
ing it from the relationship.
Compare and contrast this to how we work with our partners in
business. We set objectives, targets, and have service level agreements.
We say “the numbers speak for themselves.” In my view, numbers
never speak for themselves; there is always a story behind them. The
most important purpose of performance indicators is to trigger discus-
sion between coworkers, inside and outside the organization, in order
to create alignment. Alignment between the mind and the heart,
between what people do within the organization and what people tell
the outside world, between how the organization is being perceived
by the different stakeholders, and how the organization perceives
itself.
The performance network creates that alignment between the vari-
ous stakeholders. It doesn’t always mean that they have the same objec-
tives or the same set of values, but building the performance network