Driving change can be a daunting task for even the most seasoned executive. Even with a clear vision and purpose in place, the appeal of the status quo can produce lip service, but no real change. Too often, purpose and vision clarification efforts fail because change efforts are pursued in a fragmented and transactional manner. Innergy's approach is to put purpose and strategy at the center of all stakeholder communications, engagement, and behavior change strategies.

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Purpose-Driven Approach

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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A purpose-driven approach starts with capturing your purpose story which includes:

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1. what you stand for, your purpose and values along with

2. what you are striving for, your mission and vision.

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Your purpose story becomes the energizing force and decision-making touchstone for everything you do internally and externally. Internally, it drives messaging & communications, cultural skill-building, performance challenges, and the rituals of recognition. Externally, it drives messaging & communications, education & events, incentives & promotions, and reinforces loyalty.

 

A purpose-driven approach integrates what you stand for with what you strive for. In fact, we see this as the very definition of leadership - working together collaboratively to achieve goals while living up to values and bringing out the best in one another. Leadership is not a position. Rather, it is a mindset and a set of behaviors that can be exhibited by people at all levels. Research reveals that an adaptive culture of leaders at every level is what sets apart high-performing businesses apart from low-performing ones. Clarity of purpose combined with equipping and inspiring everyone to be a leader creates a positive tension for growth into higher and higher levels of performance. We call this the stretch-zone of performance.

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Stretch-Zone of Performance

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The stretch-zone of performance is the place of optimal challenge and learning fueled by people who are motivated to change their own behavior. This is the key! Sustainable behavior change only occurs when people want to change, not when they are coerced to change which often triggers a stress zone of fear and dysfunction. Cultural skill-building and performance challenges create growth mindsets, enabling people to pursue goals as collaborative learning adventures as opposed to conquests for status and acclaim. Rituals of recognition encourage and celebrate values-based behaviors and excellence. 

 

Designing strategies and programs for stretch-zone performance is grounded in two fields of study: sustainable behavior change and stage-based adult development.

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Sustainable Behavior Change

Innergy's program design draws on a deep understanding of human motivation and behavior change based in both scientific research and over 30-years of hands-on business experience. One of the cornerstone models is the four-drive theory of human behavior. This theory was developed by the late Paul Lawrence and Dean Nitin Nohria, with Harvard Business School. Paul Lawrence was Mary Beth McEuen's role model and mentor for the four-drive theory. The theory describes how four emotion-based drives shape thinking and behavior and the importance of designing business practices that motivate the whole person, not just engaging people in a purely transactional manner. Paul Lawrence encouraged business leaders to utilize a four-drive approach to creating value for every stakeholder of the business activating:

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• The drive to bond for trusted relationships

• The drive to create for new ideas and learning

• The drive to achieve for goal pursuit and acquiring resources

• The drive to defend for protection from injustices and harm.

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Practically speaking, the four-drive theory is applied to the design of stretch-zone performance programs through five sustainable behavior change strategies:

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1. Organizational and personal vision of success (drive to create)

2. Concrete goals and behavioral practices (drive to achieve)

3. Progress feedback and learning (drive to create/achieve)

4. Social support and encouragement (drive to bond)

5. Collaboration skills that equip people to work together to generate desired results while overcoming defensive routines that side-track learning and effectiveness (all four drives).

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Innergy's sustainable behavior change methodology not only facilitates stretch-zone performance in the short-term, it equips people with a growth and mutual learning mindset necessary for a lifelong journey of growing as a leader. Leaders grow in predictable stages. And a leaders stage of development is highly correlated to their leadership effectiveness.

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Stage-Based Adult Development

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An adaptive culture of leaders requires that people be developed as leaders who are self-aware of biases and blindspots, able to critically think through problems and proactively pursue goals. This capability is not a given in all adults. In fact, over 10% of managers do not have it along with a larger percentage of the overall workforce population. A culture of leaders strives to close this gap with 100% of the workforce developed to the transactional leader stage. People in leadership positions should possess action logics at the results-driven leader or the more expansive transformational leader stage.

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The law of the lid was popularized by John Maxwell who says the leader is the lid for the organization which cannot grow and succeed at a level beyond the leader's capacity. Innergy utilizes academically-rigorous stage-based practices inside culture skill-building and leadership development workshops and programs to raise the leadership lid allowing an organization's vision to be transformed into reality.

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