PARTNERING for transformation
Our mission is clear. Large companies—and those who lead them—possess an enormous capacity to shape society, better communities, and provide opportunity to develop and grow employees to reach their full potential. We believe this is best accomplished in the pursuit of challenging business outcomes, done in conjunction with innovation, a high engagement culture, and growing customer value. We exist to help great leaders lead excellent corporations to accomplish extraordinary things. Succinctly, our mission is to help great leaders achieve theirs.
Our Values
Integrity. This means doing the right thing. Protecting client information. Representing our capabilities honestly. Saying what we will do, and doing what we say.
Partnering with people. This means partnering with people first—and through them, with the organization. With the belief that we best help the corporation by helping the people tasked with the corporation’s objectives. Further, this means respecting individuals at all levels of the organization, regardless of role, and recognizing the importance of everyone’s contribution to collective success.
Clients come first. This means continually driving toward our clients’ outcomes. Not merely delivering good work. It means serving, seeing around the corner for our clients, and never making unneeded suggestions.
Delivering overwhelming value. This means going above and beyond. Continual innovation. Bringing more value tomorrow than we bring today.
Client enablement. This means we win by helping our clients win. In sports, players win championships but coaches lose them. We heartily embrace our role as “coach” and find our fulfillment in helping our clients excel.
Results-orientation. This means a continual focus on the numbers. With a core belief that the best organizations (as the best professional sports teams) achieve their greatest potential in the pursuit of winning championships. And in business, this means industry-leading numeric results.
Expanding the sense of what is possible. This means helping clients see and tap more than they currently think possible. Reaching higher. Increasing confidence. Up-leveling thinking. Expanding horizons.
Social impact. This means seeing and helping clients leverage their unique potential in the broader context. To create wealth, expand opportunity, and help solve major social issues, such as tapping the potential of wellness programs to address the growing global obesity epidemic. Helping clients recognize their unique opportunity as large corporations to help shape a brighter future.
Our Approach
Partnership. The most impactful way to bring value to a client is by becoming their partner. We engage the opportunity with the mindset of serving. This is our starting point. We respect our clients’ challenges and never help from an “ivory tower” viewpoint. We join in the trenches with our clients; helping them win on their fields of battle.
Knowledge and expertise. The most important expertise a consulting firm brings to a client is that which unlocks the expertise, skill, and growth of the client. This important distinction shapes how we approach the partnership, how we align with clients in every engagement, and it shapes who we employ to help our clients. We have a rigorous outcome-orientation, and whenever possible, encourage engagements where we are involved from concept to outcome. And we engage field-proven talent who begin with a result-orientation, rather than a conceptual-orientation. We take a Systems Thinking view of the enterprise and operate from rigorous conceptual frameworks. But we avoid buzzwords, and continually lean toward what works in the field, what matters to customers, and what moves the numbers.
Long-term relationships. This is the foundation. With the ever-accelerating pace of change, trust has become a most precious of commodities. As the Worldwide Vice President of Sales of a leading technology firm told our CEO, “Everyone on my team must trust each other completely. We are changing continually, on so many fronts, if we don’t trust each other implicitly, we will not be able to adapt and change as fast as we have to.” We understand that long-term, high-trust, ever-increasing-value relationships with partners are one of the keys to competitive advantage for business leaders going forward. We always take the long view. With the goal that today’s client engagement broadens the base of trust that can be built on tomorrow.
Risk management. Effective risk management is a critical priority in today’s environment. This applies not only to our client organizations but also within our firm. We recognize our responsibility to maintain the highest of professional standards. We continually work to improve our processes and systems to assure robust security and effective information management.