【正文】 one and number two in importance to institutional investors out of 22 nonfinancial measures. John Inch, a managing director and analyst at Bear Stearns notes that in some sectors, such as diversified industrial panies, intangibles account for even more—up to half a pany’s value. “You can take even a mundane asset and inject good management and have something pretty strong,” says Inch. 1. Achieve Radical Clarity by decoding strategy at the topThe first step in successfully executing strategy is achieving clarity on the top team, which is frequently the source of garbled signals. Lack of Clarity at the TopA recent Hay Group study Hay Group partnered with Richard Hackman of Harvard University and Ruth Wageman of Dartmouth College to identify the dynamics of top executive teams and their impact on performance. From an initial group of 48 teams, the researchers narrowed their study to 14 teams, many from large global organizations. Each team member represented the head of an organization, a major business division, or a major geography. shows a disturbing lack of clarity on top teams (organizational clarity measures the extent to which employees understand what is expected of them and how those expectations connect with the organization’s larger goals). The chart below shows dramatically higher levels of clarity on outstanding vs. average teams. In fact the biggest single difference between great and average top teams and typical ones was in the level of internal clarity. See Figure 1.Figure 1: Organizational Climate and Teams58%18%Figure 1: Measures organizational climate dimensions for outstanding top teams vs. typical ones. For each dimension of climate we asked how the team was performing in reality and how it should be performing. Then we measured the difference or “gap” in their answers. Gaps over 20% hurt performance. The “clarity” gap for typical teams was 58% pared with 18% on outstanding teams. [Change Hay/McBer to “Source: Hay Group, Inc.” in final version]And a Lack of Clarity BelowWorkers at lower levels strongly feel this lack of clarity. Figure 2 looks at satisfaction levels for workers planning to leave their organizations within two years versus those planning to stay longer. This study showed that a key reason people leave their jobs is that they feel their panies lack direction. Even among employees planning to stay more than two years at their panies, only 57% felt their organizations had a clear sense of direction. Figure 2: Key reasons why employees leave their panies Total % Satisfied Source: Hay Group, Inc. The results are from our Employee Attitude Survey, which sampled some 300 panies representing more than 1 million workers. Our survey queried management, professionals, salespeople, information technologists, and clerical and hourly workers. The “gap” referred to in the table is the “satisfaction gap” between workers planning to leave within two years and those planning to stay longer.Satisfaction with:Employees planning to stay more than two years (%)Employees planning to leave in less than two years (%)GAP(%)1. Use of my skills and abilities83%49%34%2. Ability of top management74%41%33%3. Company has clear sense of direction57%27%30%[NOTE。 or, simply don’t realize that successful strategy execution will never happen without ongoing performance dialogue. Part of the solution to this problem is creating systems and processes that force performance dialogue. General Dynamics Defense Systems (GDDS) in Pittsfield, MA, is one pany where creating such systems has contributed to dramatic results. From 1999 to 2001, attrition among its valued software engineers dropped from 20 percent to percent. Union grievances dropped from 57 to zero, saving hundreds of thousands of dollars. And, best of all, earnings and profit margins doubled. What GDDS didIn 1999 the $200 million plus defense contractor challenged its employees to improve the pany’s negotiating leverage on bids, and thereby increase margins and profitability. To acplish this goal, senior management directed all departments to chase out costs, and created numerous processes to transmit the costcutting strategy down the managerial ranks right to the shop floor, which is where they felt many of the best costcutting ideas would e fromCarmen Simonelli, director of facilities and security, says his department’s goal was to push labor costs 5 percent below budget, with a “stretch” goal of 6 percent. That was ambitious given that direct applied labor costs had been running 1015 percent over budget. But Simonelli’s team slashed applied labor hours to an unthinkable 20 percent below budget. Annual savings amounted to about $440,000 on a $2 million budget, or nearly $10,000 per worker.How did they do it? The key, Simonelli says, was the processes the pany put in place to enhance dialogue and carry the message to the shop floor. For example: The Learning MapThe pany made it easy for employees to understand its broad goals by creating a “l(fā)earning map,” which graphically outlined how each department and team linked directly to core objectives. All employees saw at a glance how their jobs fit in. Supervisors and assemblers in Simonelli’s group, for example, could readily see that by reducing applied labor hours in a project, GDDS could increase margins, shorten delivery schedules and raise the chances for winning new contracts.The ScorecardManagers and direct reports at GDDS meet one on one to create Scorecards, which set out five to seven personal annual goals. For example, the goals for shipping and receiving supervisor Tom Molleurs included plans to capture all incentive payments for early delivery and to cut direct costs 5%. Once a manager and subordinate reach agreement goals, they both sign the Scorecard as if it were a contract. From the worker’s perspective,