This week: Words about words

This week’s Driver: How to Predict Legal Stuff

So, if you’re with me this far, you believe that legal stuff can be predicted. That’s because you know that it’s actually started by a person: and, if they can think of a legal issue, you can think of it. Now it’s time to look at how we do that predicting. And, to give you a jumpstart on this, let’s just lay it all on the table, right now, up front.

Here are the specific steps I use with the businesses I work with to predict that legal stuff, so that you can make them happen in your business.

1. Specifically set aside time to do the predicting

Predicting the legal stuff that can come at you and derail your long-term plan is important work. But it is work that’s unlikely to ever feel urgent until it's too late. So you’re going to have to make yourself do this thinking.

Set aside specific time in an upcoming Exec team meeting. Hold yourself and your team to account to all focus on this topic in that meeting. Then agree to repeat it again at a set regular interval.

2.  Make a block diagram of your business

This sounds a little bit basic. It’ll feel a little bit basic as you’re doing it. But I still want you to do make a simple block diagram of your business anyway. Don't just focus on the stuff you do directly: include all the core things that third parties do for you. And I want it to cover all the way from nose to tail. To predict all the potential legal issues waiting to take out your business plan, you need to cover your entire footprint to be able.

3. Do a Relationship Audit

Now we get down to the nitty gritty. For each block in your business, list out all the key relationships you have that relate to the activity in that block. Think as widely as possible about those relationships. Don’t just list the obvious ones, like customers, suppliers and staff. Also include the easily forgotten ones like competitors, regulators, neighbours. Heck, if you've got them, include those people trying to rip you off: because, like it or not, you have a relationship with them.

Remember, we’re doing this because all legal issues stem from how a particular person (rightly or wrongly) feels that you're short-changing them in your relationship with them.

4. Find the mismatches and shortfalls

For each of those relationships, review and consider these three things:

• what you've promised them

• what they might expect, both now and in the future (ignore whether you think their expectations are reasonable or not), and

• what you're currently doing (or not doing) for them

Then take those three things and compare them. You're specifically looking for where there might be a mismatch or shortfall between what you’ve promised, what you’re doing and what they expect. That's where the opportunities to bulletproof your plan lie.

5. Fill in the Gap ASAP

Now, its time to move from thinking to doing. Where there's a mismatch or shortfall between what you're doing and what they expect or have been promised, work out what you can do to fill in that shortfall ASAP. Then go and do it. So you catch every little weakness before it becomes a big plan-busting problem.

And that’s the overview of the 5 pro-active steps you need to put the relationships first in your business, predict your legal stuff and melt any icebergs in the path to your plan. So you land your plan, transform your business, and cement your legacy

Does that involve some work and thought on your part? Yes, of course. But it's nothing you're not capable of. And proactively putting that effort in up front is a small ask compared to the consequences of letting a legal issue derail your plan.

This Week’s Sleeper: The Words We Use

Words are powerful. And the Oxford English Dictionary covers a mere 500,000 of them.  That rather demands that we use words with care, thought and precision.  But if we’re honest, do we really do that?

We can use different words just for variety. We sometimes use them more for how they sound, than how they mean. In pretty much every walk of life, we let jargon creep in. We use certain terms, almost without thinking, just because that’s what the people before us were using.  And we’re all great at using the words we’re familiar with and assuming that they mean the same to everyone else. 

We’ve all got a little complacent and ca sleep on our words having the impact we expect them to. All while our words aren’t necessarily being understood by our audience as well as we think they are. And if our words aren’t understood, they can’t be acted on.

We can’t complacent about the words we use when it comes to those things that we want people to do in order to protect our business and drive it forward.  So to protect your long-term plan, you need to think more carefully about the terms you use in the policies, instructions and even ‘all staff’ communications that you issue in your business.

Let me give you an example. When trying to make our businesses more robust, the default term that’s used is “risk”. But “risk” feels both technical and theoretical. It maybe even seems mythical. At ASOS, “risk” was a word that was guaranteed to get all of the ‘non-corporate’ 20-somethings that worked there to switch off. “Risk” certainly wasn’t a term that engaged them or inspired them into action.  But when I talked about “threats” rather than “risks”? Well, that was a completely different story.

The terms we use dramatically affect the impact that we get. And, to protect your plan and transform your business, you need to make sure you’re thinking properly about whether the words you use really are inspiring the action you need.

Till next week

Andrew

PS: If you’ve got any questions or comments on ‘Clear Course’, I’d really love to hear them. So don’t be shy, OK?