What is your personal “Dieselgate”?

One of the largest and most discussed news stories of the last few weeks has been the Volkswagen “Dieselgate” scandal of manipulated CO2 emissions. Most of the comments point to the company leadership as sort of “evil”, incapable, ignorant, or at least as ridiculously negligent. Yet, this is not the point. 

“Dieselgate” can happen to your company or team too. Faster than you might think.

And perhaps it is happening already, just with less visible damage. What am I talking about? 

Things like the Volkswagen scandal happen each day within companies and teams – and even families – when the connection to the WHY gets lost; when people forget to ask the question “Why are we doing what we are doing” on a regular basis, or when they cannot give any answer. 

Volkswagen was founded to build affordable cars for the masses. This clear mission has been replaced by maximising profit, gaining market share, and chasing the goals of the CEO to reduce CO2 emissions. There’s nothing wrong with these goals, but the disaster begins as soon as they start replacing the mission, the bigger cause, the WHY of the company. 

The bad news: this can easily happen to your business or team as well. The good news: you can avoid this by answering these three simple questions: 

1. Do all of your team members and managers know precisely what they are fighting for each day? What is the overarching dream that they follow when working with you? This might sound dramatic, but a shared mission is exactly what makes teams outstanding and successful.
2. Are most of your decisions guided by this mission? Or do you and your managers decide based on short-term objectives? Did monthly earnings become more important than fighting for the mission? Did cost-saving programs take over the internal discussions?
3. Do you constantly demonstrate the importance of the mission, of the WHY? If I parachuted into your company and asked your co-workers, would they all be able to tell me about the mission and why it’s important to each of them personally?

What next?

These all are questions to be asked if you’re striving for a peak performance culture for your company or team. Check out my related workshop to learn more. Click here.