Way too often, it’s so much easier to blame a problem on a person rather than digging a little deeper to understand what the root cause of the problem really is.
That’s the value of understanding the 3 Gates of Focus.
If a CEO tells you that they have a problem with one of his/her managers, you can easily create a stages of growth conversation by simply asking:
Could the issue have anything to do with the process that manager is trying to work with?
Could he/she be struggling with keeping target dates due to a lack of proper funding for their project?
Could the issue be that they just don’t have the right training to handle the situation?
I love engaging a CEO around the topic of the 3 Gates of Focus.
If I know they are a Stage 3 company and I hear that they are concerned about profits, lack of sales, lack of accountability, etc., I can simply ask them where their focus today lies – are you working to release more and more control to your key employees – are you setting expectations and managing to those expectations – do your employees know what’s expected of them today?
Questions that generate great conversations can easily start by using the 3 Gates of Focus, explaining that every issue in a company will land under one of these Gates:
Profit/Revenue
People
Process
This is a great introduction to the 7 Stages of Growth and I can begin to explain the model in terms they have already resonated with.
Remember my mantra: You aren’t selling an X-Ray! You are uncovering the obstacles that CEO is facing because you know that as a Stage 2 CEO, they are dealing with the top challenge of ‘Hiring Quality People’ and you know that as a Stage 5 CEO they may be struggling to bring a management team together. Talk to them about their concerns and bring those concerns back to the 7 Stages of Growth.
Here’s where you’ll find my 27-minute video on Understanding the 3 Gates of Focus
Under X-Ray Videos
Understanding the 3 Gates of Focus – Page One
http://www.gcspecialists.com/member-dashboard/
No matter what your CEOs issues are, you can be confident in knowing that some aspect of better understanding the 7 Stages of Growth can provide relief. My go-to-plan whenever I am able to talk with a CEO is to ask how many employees they have today, how many they had one year ago and how many he/she plans to have in the next 12 months.
Right away I can get a good sense of how much chaos they are in, what challenges they are addressing (or forgot to address) and introduce the 3 Gates of Focus concept to see where they are spending their time and open the conversation up to finding their ‘pain’ points.
Your success. My passion.
Laurie Taylor, FlashPoint!
