"I am not afraid of an army led by a sheep, but I am afraid of an army of sheep led by a lion."
- Alexander the Great, quoted in FAST, page 139
"It is true intelligence for a man to take a subject that is mysterious and great in itself and to unfold and simplify it so that a child can understand it."- John H. Taylor, quoted in FAST, page 91
Simplicity is about the “How”. Do you understand the problem? Have you clearly communicated the solution? Is your best approach easy to understand? Simplicity builds belief, which in turn leads to success.
Many people tend to make their businesses exceeding complex. They have too many metrics to measure and an antiquated invoicing system, for instance. It is paramount for achieving success to keep solutions as simple as possible. Simplicity is about stripping back complexities that weigh businesses down. Focusing on simple solutions does not mean easy and simple solutions are often harder to find. Tredgold gives 12 steps to implement simplicity and allow for more concentrated focus.
To increase simplicity we need to eliminate any unnecessary tasks and keep communication clear and simple to maximize understanding.
As Leonardo da Vinci said, “Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.”
"When I speak of transparency, I am actually referring to the blend of truth and knowledge of where we really are, what our real performance is, and what we need to do in order to succeed."- FAST, page 109
Transparency is about looking beneath the surface of business performance and growth. Like an iceberg we’re only seeing the tip; we must look beneath the surface and share the actual data, we must clarify where we are and where we need to go. Sharing of knowledge allows a leader to empower and engage employees in a common goal. Some actionable steps to allow clarity and concise sharing are to:
Transparency is a fine balance between secrecy and oversharing. As leader you must learn to discern between the two.
Some simple suggestion to increase transparency:
The opposite of transparency is confusion, malalignment and uncertainty. Confusion leads to poor performance and poor outcomes and uncertainty becomes fear and resentment.
Try this: Measure team engagement by comparison against your industry’s norm. If the results are average then we would expect our business to be consistent with the norm, which in today’s climate is generally poor.
"If there was just one principle that you would choose to implement, which one would it be?"- FAST, page 139
The answer is all of them.
In order to gain the best results by implementing FAST, determine your weakest link among Focus, Accountability, Simplicity, or Transparency.
Begin by concentrating on the weakest link first; one will lead to another to achieve success.
Simplicity allows employees to focus with more clarity and transparency enables better accountability.
FAST is an easy read. The content is gold to any business because the information can easily be understood, easily explained and generates food for thought in leadership and business management.
Gordon Tredgold is a former corporate warrior who now writes, speaks, and coaches on leadership, achieving results and driving success. Gordon preaches simplicity in everything and has developed the FAST Approach and his mission is to help people exceed their potential and achieve amazing results.
