Characteristics of a Winning Environment

Purpose-driven

In a market economy, it is rare to find business units within a corporation which are not established for some purpose.  But merely existing for the accomplishment of a purpose is not identical to being driven by that purpose.  Purpose-driven units organize, operate, and subsist in response to the fulfillment of a single goal or set of goals above all others.  The degree to which a unit’s activities adapt to effect these goals is the degree to which the unit is driven by them.

Purposes of units must be aligned, even if indirectly, with the purposes of the larger organization.  While it is uncommon for all units to generate revenue, each should remain focused upon a purpose which aids in the development of the organization as a whole.

Structurally independent

Agents that operate on behalf of the purpose can be grouped into a logical unit.  This unit might be a department, a team, or a single person.  The ability of this unit to operate independently of other units within the corporate structure represents its structural independence.  Once again independence is a matter of degree: a unit whose operations can be effected smoothly with little or no assistance from other corporate units is structurally independent.  Note that in order for a unit to remain internally purpose-driven, it cannot be completely structurally independent of the corporation.  In such cases the unit is commonly spun-off, as the economic benefit of its operations in a larger world becomes greater than the cost of its assistance internally.

Internally flexible

In order for a unit to respond to its purpose effectively, it must possess some degree of flexibility in its operations.  This flexibility includes not only the ability to reorganize operations themselves, but also the ability to monitor their success.  A higher degree of flexibility is given to those units that can pinpoint operational failures and attempt a corrective reorganization most quickly.  Those corrections that provide positive result increase the degree to which a unit is purpose-driven.  As a rule, the smaller the team and better the monitoring mechanisms, the better the flexibility.