How do you measure success?
Not with a sliding scalE
The next series of blog posts will focus on Ropey Racing at a meta level. How it is as a project, business and dream. I will draw on my experience as a business and organisational development specialist and as a 31 year old who wanted to be successful. So that is where we’ll start, success.
The historical measure of business success, any business executive will tell you, is a series of metrics or key performance indicators. They’ll also tell you that these metrics will analyse the entirety of a business. What they won’t tell you is the only one anyone used to listen to is the bottom line financial figure. Is the business profitable. An interesting concept, only in the past decade or so have businesses realised that focussing too heavily on the financial aspects of a business can hinder growth. Take a company that makes quarterly financial reports, those responsible for meeting quarterly targets will shift their lens away from those audacious long term goals and focus on how to make the most money short term. Those same individuals will be very nervous about reporting a quarterly loss, despite possibly knowing that such a loss will be a distant memory in 36 months time. The fear of not achieving performance metrics, in their own way, halted performance. In most cases, at least in my experience, a business will move its metrics. This metric slip then removes any chance of ever meeting those long term, strategic goals. So, what was wrong, the strategic goals, the performance metrics, the individuals or the approach? In my opinion, the approach is where organisations failed. But what if the approach was wrong from the beginning? From the formulation of strategic goals? Well, let’s look at Ropey Racing:
Ropey Racing strategic goals, or as we like to call them, the manifesto.
Make car parts that I couldn’t easily get hold of so others can
Use the money made from that to make existing parts more accessible
Have a good time whilst doing 1 and 2
The approach to our strategic goals, or manifesto, or driving force, or whatever you will call it, were intentionally simple. Knowing that Ropey Racing would be a project that would have to be completed in spare time meant that the manifesto had to be bullshit proof. It had to be something that, during times of confusion and chaos, would answer the most complex of business questions. The most important one for me is number 3. I had to enjoy this. You’ll discover as part of this series of blog posts that there were times when I very much did not enjoy Ropey Racing. You’ll also discover how I got back on track.
The manifesto, as it currently stands, is short. It will grow. It won’t grow to more than 10 points, if anything just to fuel my delusions of Grandeur, and it won’t ever have any points removed. I believe this to be one of the most powerful approaches to strategic planning. A fixed manifesto that will always record the purpose, mission and vision of a business concept. It will act as guidance for governance, planning, key decisions and hopefully growth. Adding to the manifesto, when considering its described purpose, suddenly makes any fickle changes to your strategic goals intentionally more difficult. It makes you analyse and assess whether the decisions you make are worthy of being set in stone, so to speak.
Manifesto point 4
Ropey Racing is about due its forth manifesto point. Having survived its first 18 months, it is due some addition to help guide the next 18 months. However, adding this next point has been something I’ve been nervous about for quite some time. What is a decision, goal or direction worthy of such stature. What would Moses do? Well, more than anything, probably take guidance from the people. This is exactly the plan here. Point 4 will be guided and hopefully owned by the community Ropey Racing aimed to serve. Maybe it will ask for only one off limited run parts. Many of our customers want to be ‘the first’ to own a product, some even want ‘1 of 1’ variations of our products. Maybe it will want more given back to the community. Designs to be openly shared without copyright to truly become community developed. I’m excited to see what comes back.
so how do you measure success?
Well, for Ropey Racing, success is measured simply. Are we still meeting our manifesto pledge? As long as we are, then we are successful. Now I know what you’re thinking, there’s way more to it than that. Of course there is, however you always need a way to see through the fog of life and this is our guiding light. So my advice to you, should you be wanting to measure your own success, is to write a manifesto. Keep it to 10 points or less. Stick to it. Only add to it things that will always matter to you. Never take anything off it because at some point, that point on your manifesto mattered. A gentle reminder of where you came from. Take your time, the first point is the most significant, but not the most important. Don’t restrict yourself too much, freedom is something we’re all, in our own ways, still fighting for. Be ambitious, after all you’re only measuring yourself. Most of all, don’t measure your progress too often. Guiding lights are only useful in darkness, when the sun is shining, kick back and grab a beer.