You can find a wealth of information about how a business runs and how well it does with it’s employees and customers simply by listening to the words the leaders use.
Words create perception; perception creates a perceived reality; a perceived reality drives behavior. And – behavior has consequences, by either reinforcing or deteriorating relationships. [Tip: One of our current favorite business books explores this principle in great detail - Tribal Leadership, Leveraging Natural Groups to Build a Thriving Organization (2011), by Dave Logan, John King & Halee Fischer-Wright.]
Listen to the words used in your organization. Do you hear phrases such as:
- Our CEO is incompetent
- This place sucks – we have no chance to do what we want
- The customer has no idea what he wants
- People around here just aren’t making the grade, no wonder we’re behind our competition
- The problem with some of our people is their not ready for prime time
- The only person you can trust is yourself – everyone’s out for their own back
Or, do you hear phases like:
- Our customers are amazing and remarkably loyal
- If it wasn’t for this team there would be no way we could have finished this project
- We have so many good people no wonder we are doing so well
- Our problem is that we are growing fast, which is a good problem to have
- Our CEO actually gave his cell phone number out and we are all welcome to call him if we have a concern
- This is such a great place to work, staff love it here and so do our customers
Look at the words used – customer, employee, CEO, description of the employees, how employees are referred to – similar words; very different meaning. And how they are used and how regularly will largely influence your culture – thereby your employees’ experience, customers experience and ultimately, your profitability!
As the leader, CEO, President, business owner, you have a responsibility to set the example, to shape the culture of the organization – and one key way you do this is through your use of language.
And if you happen to think that how you use language is not all that important, you can be sure of one thing – your past employees and your past customers got it. What would they say, you said?
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Copyright 2011 Kubica LaForest Consulting
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