High Performance07

A m e r i c a n M a n a g e m e n t A s s o c i a t i o n
HOW TO BUILD A
HIGH-PERFORMANCE
ORGANIZATION
A Global Study of Current Trends and Future Possibilities
2007-2017
Canada USA - Latin America - Asia - Pacific Europe - Middle East - Africa
A m e r i c a n M a n a g e m e n t A s s o c i a t i o n
HOW
HOWTO
TOBUILD
BUILDA
AHIGH-PERFORMANCE
HIGH-PERFORMANCE
ORGANIZATION
A Global Study of Current Trends and Future Possibilities
2007-2017
Copyright 2007, American Management Association

For more information about American Management Association, visit www.amanet.org
HOW TO BUILD A HIGH-PERFORMANCE ORGANIZATION >>
Table of Contents
PAGE
Foreword . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . v
Introduction. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vi
A Brief History of High-Performance Theory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
External Factors Influencing Organizational Performance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

Talents and Skills of the Workforce. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
Global Competition. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
Faster and More Disruptive Change. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
Technology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
Political and Regulatory Changes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
The Influence of Ethics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
Environmental Changes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
Characteristics of High-Performance Organizations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
A Model of High-Performance Organizations. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
High Performance in Practice: What the Survey Data Tell Us . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19
Strategic Approaches: Consistent, Clear and Well Thought Out . . . . . . . . . . 19
Customer Approaches: Going Above and Beyond . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
Leadership Approaches: Focused on Performance, Beliefs
and Talent. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21
Processes and Structure: Centered Around Metrics, Customers,
and Training . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23
Values and Beliefs: Upbeat, Ethical, and Ready for Challenges . . . . . . . . . . . 24
The Context for High-Performance Organizations. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
Summary of Results. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26
High Performance in the Year 2017 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27
Interview with Sara Ohmet, CEO of HIPOC. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
Proactive, Analytical, and Values-Driven . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
Clear, Consistent, and Customer-Focused. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30
Well Led and Resilient. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31
Involved with the Community. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
High Tech and High Touch . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
Transparent, Healthy, and Professionally Managed . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33
Conclusion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
ii
Epilogue . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37
Appendix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
About this Survey. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38
Demographic Questions and Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
Table 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
Table 2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
Table 3 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39
Table 4 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
Table 5 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
Table 6 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40
Table 7 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
Table 8 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41
Table 9 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
Performance Questions and Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
About These Categories . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
Table 10 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43
Table 11 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
Value Proposition Questions and Results. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
Table 12 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
Table 13 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
Product Questions and Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
Table 14 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45
Table 15 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
Management Questions and Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
Table 16 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
Table 17 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Process Questions and Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Table 18 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Table 19 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
Employee Questions and Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
Table 20 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48
Table 21 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
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Strategy Questions and Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49

Table 22 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49
Table 23 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 51
Customer Questions and Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
Table 24 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
Table 25 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54
Leadership Questions and Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
Table 26 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55
Table 27 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56
Performance Questions and Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
Table 28 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
Table 29 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59
Culture Questions and Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
Table 30 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 61
Table 31 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63
Ethics Questions and Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
Table 32 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
Table 33 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 65
Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
Authors and Contributors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
About AMA and the Institute for Corporate Productivity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71
iv
Foreword
Today’s businesses face unprecedented challenges. Leaders are confronted with increased
competition, globalization, demand for growing social responsibilities, technological
changes, and new strategic thinking. These need to be managed to build and sustain a
high-performance organization.
To support your efforts, American Management Association commissioned the
Institute for Corporate Productivity, previously the Human Resource Institute, to
conduct a study to determine the impact of today’s challenges on organizations and
the best practices associated with successful organizations. The High-Performance
Organization Survey 2007 asked 1,369 respondents about a series of organizational
characteristics that the literature suggests are associated with high performance. It also
inquired about revenue growth, market share, profitability, and customer satisfaction.
Our hope is that the answers from the study will give you guidelines to develop an
action plan for your organization’s growth.
Like all studies, there are limitations to the findings. As you will read in this
report, we found several practices that are characteristic of high-performance
organizations. We also identified external factors that influence corporate
performance. Note that these can increase performance or slow it, in certain
circumstances.
The study identified five integrated components of a high-performance
organization: strategy, customer focus, leadership, processes, and values. There were
specific practices determined within each of the five components that were found to
be critical. The external influencers included talents and the skills in the workforce,
global competition, faster and more disruptive change within the industry, and
technological developments.
Through its various programs and services, including our webcasts and
podcasts, AMA is committed to help you to adjust to the external influences identified
in the study and reinvigorate your organization to the rapidly changing environment
that surrounds you.
Edward T. Reilly
President and Chief Executive Officer
American Management Association
v
Introduction
High-performance companies are the role models of the organizational world. They
represent real-world versions of a modern managerial ideal: the organization that is so
excellent in so many areas that it consistently outperforms most of its competitors for
extended periods of time.
Managers want to know more about high-performance organizations so they
can apply the lessons learned to their own companies. Of course, the goal is to ensure
that their own organizations excel in the marketplace.
The truth is, however, that it’s hard to discern exactly why some organizations
perform better than others. First, there’s the problem of determining which organiza-
tions are high performers. Should analysts study only those that outperform others
in their own industry? How long a time period should they conduct the assessment?
And which measures, financial or otherwise, are the best ones to use?
Once analysts settle on answers to those questions, they must try to determine
the reasons that a given organization performs so well. After all, organizations tend to
be complex and unique entities. This makes it difficult to draw straightforward lessons
from them.
Despite these difficulties, researchers have been trying to identify and study
high-performance organizations for years. Much has been learned during this time.
As Julia Kirby (2005) noted in the Harvard Business Review, management experts
continue to build on one another’s work in order to formulate more sophisticated
ideas about organizational performance.
This study continues in that tradition, building on the theoretical work of others
even as it provides new insights about high-performance organizations. Toward this
end, a team of researchers analyzed the business literature in this area and conducted
a global survey looking at the characteristics associated with high performance.
The High-Performance Organization Survey 2007—commissioned by American
Management Association (AMA) and conducted by the Institute for Corporate
Productivity—asked 1,369 respondents about a series of organizational characteristics
that the literature suggests are associated with high performance. It also inquired about
revenue growth, market share, profitability, and customer satisfaction. The research
vi
team correlated responses about market performance with responses about strategy,
leadership, customer-orientation, and other factors. Based on those findings, the team
divided respondents into high, middle and low performers.
Like all survey data, these results have their limitations. Correlation is not causa-
tion, and the data are based on self-reports rather than on external market information.
Nonetheless, the results provide clues to what separates high-performance organizations
from their low-performance counterparts. Generally speaking, high-performance
organizations are superior to their low-performance counterparts in the following areas:
• Their strategies are more consistent, are clearer, and are well thought out.
They are more likely than other companies to say that their philosophies are
consistent with their strategies.
• They are more likely to go above and beyond for their customers. They strive
to be world-class in providing customer value, think hard about customers’
future and long-term needs, and exceed customer expectations. And they are
more likely to see customer information as the most important factor for
developing new products and services.
• They are more likely to adhere to high ethical standards throughout the
organization.
• Their leaders are relatively clear, fair, and talent-oriented. They are more
likely to promote the best people for a job, make sure performance expectations
are clear, and convince employees that their behaviors affect the success of the
organization.
• They are superior in terms of clarifying performance measures, training
people to do their jobs, and enabling employees to work well together.
They also make customer needs a high priority.
• Their employees are more likely to think the organization is a good place
to work. They also emphasize a readiness to meet new challenges and are
committed to innovation.
• Their employees use their skills, knowledge, and experience to create
unique solutions for customers.
The study also indicates that even high-performance organizations could
improve in various areas. It found, for example, that high performers are much more
likely than low performers to report that their organization-wide performance meas-
ures match their organizations’ strategies. This was, in fact, the single largest difference
between the two groups. Even so, the data show that higher performers, taken as a
whole, could do considerably more to match their performance metrics with their
strategies.
There’s likely a lesson to be learned here: like great athletes, even high-performance
organizations must continuously strive to improve and “work on their games.”
Without the passion for improvement, they are unlikely to remain high performers
for long. After all, there’s no shortage of business leaders who are working hard to
ensure that their own companies reach the top echelons of organizational excellence.
vii
A Brief History of
High-Performance Theory
Although the concept and measurement of

high-performance organizations are relatively
new to management theory, they have roots
that extend at least back to the beginning of the
Industrial Revolution.
1
At the dawn of the Industrial Revolution, various employers strove hard to change
workers’ attitudes from an agrarian or craft-tradition mindset to a factory mindset.
Workers had to develop new habits such as punctuality, regular attendance, mechanical
pacing of work effort, and standardization.
Some observers of the day held a dim view of the prevalent work ethic. One
author wrote, “If a person can get sufficient (income) in four days to support himself
for seven days, he will keep holiday the other three, that is, he will live in riot and
debauchery” (Powell 1972, quoted in Briggs 1969). This line of thinking was picked
up by others, and theories emerged that bolstered the idea of controlling workers
through policy, structure, and organization.
Another line of reasoning was championed by Robert Owen, a successful
cotton manufacturer in England during the early 1800s, who chided his colleagues
for failing to understand the human element. According to Owen, managers spent
time improving machines, specializing labor, and cutting costs, yet they made no
investments in workers themselves. Owen said that money spent on improving labor
would “return you not 5, 10, or 15% for your capital but often 50 and in many cases
a 100%” (Butt 1971).
These early viewpoints provide the roots for thinking about how to develop a
high-performance organization. As industry grew, so did the theories about how to
produce more or better products in the factories, and the dichotomy between focusing
on people versus focusing on tasks and structures continued to evolve.
Scientific Management and Other Theories

Many of the next theories to surface focused on improving productivity. One of the
best-known ideas—Scientific Management—came from Frederick Taylor in the U.S.
during the late 1800s and early 1900s. Taylor said, “The principal object of management
should be to secure the maximum prosperity for the employer, coupled with the maxi-
mum prosperity for each employee.” He placed the responsibility for productivity on
management rather than on workers, saying that “it is the manager’s job to design the
jobs properly and to offer the proper incentives to overcome worker soldiering” [a term
that Taylor used to mean “taking it easy”] (Taylor 1903).
During the early 1900s, Frank and Lillian Gilbreth emerged on the management
scene with a similar method for increasing productivity. Frank Gilbreth conducted
motion studies in manufacturing; Lillian wrote one of the earliest contributions to the
understanding of the human factor in industry, The Psychology of Management
(1914), and she is known for bringing a human element into scientific management
(Wren 2005).
Meanwhile, during the early 1900s and on the other side of the Atlantic, Max
Weber in Germany and Henri Fayol in France offered their perspectives on the grow-
ing interest in increasing productivity. The problem, as Weber saw it, was how a large
organization might function more systematically. The answer, he concluded, was
bureaucracy, which meant management by the office or position rather than by a
particular person (Parsons, ed., 1947).
2
In contrast, Fayol touted the importance of managerial ability—as opposed

to only job design and structure—to improve organizational performance. He felt
managers needed particular attributes:
• Physical qualities such as health and vigor;

• Mental qualities such as the ability to understand, learn, and adapt;
• Moral qualities such as energy, firmness, and a willingness to accept responsibility;
• A general education that encompasses matters that do not belong exclusively
to the function performed;
• Special knowledge particular to the function, be it technical, commercial,
financial, managerial, and so on;
• Experience, including knowledge arising from the work itself and lessons from
personal experience (Fayol, trans.; Storrs, 1949).
Fayol also developed “principles of management,” which he felt should be

taught in universities. They included items such as division of work, authority,
discipline, unity of direction, subordination of individual interests to the general
interest, remuneration, centralization, stability of tenure of personnel, and esprit de
corps (Wren 2005).
Education and Training Focus on Performance

The ideas of these pioneers spread beyond factory management to general management,
influencing not only the business world but academia as well. In 1881, the Wharton
School of Finance and Economy at the University of Pennsylvania opened its doors as
the first undergraduate school of business. It was followed in 1898 by the University of
Chicago and the University of California at Berkeley. By 1900, the Amos Tuck School
of Administration and Finance at Dartmouth College and (in 1908) Harvard followed,
creating a business curriculum to teach managers how to manage organizations for
greater productivity. Training also became available outside of the university system.
American Management Association (2007), for example, traces its origins back to
1913 with the founding of the National Association of Corporation Schools, which
later became the National Association of Corporation Training.
Along with education and training came management research and a growing
interest from academia in the challenges associated with trying to improve productivity.
By 1933, Elton Mayo, who was on the faculty at the Wharton School of Finance and
Commerce, found that workers’ performance could not be explained by any one factor.
He emphasized the need for “effective collaboration” and a restoration of the “social
solidarity” in a changing world that left people without stability, purpose or norms
(Mayo 1933). He is credited with forming the Human Relations Movement that empha-
sized interpersonal relations, listening, communication, and sociohuman skills for the
manager/leader. One of his ideas was that leaders should balance the needs of the
worker with the economic needs of the organization.
3
Management Theory Enters the Modern Age

The Human Relations Movement had its most important influence on management
thought from about 1930 to 1950. During this time, there was inquiry into group
dynamics, participation in decision-making, leadership, and motivational appeals to
group members. In addition, there was a search for analytical tools and conceptual
models to explain the interactions of the formal and informal aspects of organizations
(Wren 2005).
After World War II, rapid growth in the economy prompted management scholars
to shift from a shop-level management orientation to general management theory.
George Terry (1960), in his book Principles of Management, defines management as
“the activity which plans, organizes, and controls the operations of the basic elements
of men, materials, machines, methods, money, and markets, providing direction and
coordination, and giving leadership to human efforts, so as to achieve the sought
objectives of the enterprise.”
Peter Drucker (1954), who is known as the greatest guru of management practice,
introduced the idea of measuring success against market potential. He focused on
the innovation of products and services and on improving how these were made or
delivered. In addition, he studied other performance-related factors, including pro-
ductivity, profitability, physical and financial resources, manager performance and
development, worker performance and attitude, and public responsibility. Drucker
also consulted with managers and encouraged them to ask the right questions, such
as “What is our business?” and “What is value to the customer?” According to Drucker,
“The important decisions are strategic decisions. Anyone who is a manager has to make
strategic decisions, and the higher his level in the management hierarchy, the more of
them he must make” (Drucker 1954).
But not every expert focused on strategy or improved human relationships as
the keys to improving performance. Paul Lawrence and Jay Lorsch (1969) took the
position that organizational structure is critical to performance, and they developed a
theory that showed managers how to analyze issues important to structure, such as
the rate of change in business environment and the relative certainty of business-related
information. Lawrence and Lorsch found that the more successful firms were those
that adjusted to their relevant environments.
As time went on, managers became perplexed by an overabundance of theories
about how to boost organizational success. Andrew Van de Ven (1999) described the
period of the ’70s as a “buzzing, blooming, confusing world of organization and
management theories resulting in a tower of babbling and fragmented explanations
of differing paradigms.” Yet, theorists tended to fall into two camps—those whose
professional interests clustered around organizational behavior and those whose
interests clustered around business policy and strategy (Pearce, 2003). Organizational
behaviorists looked to leadership, motivation, and group behaviors within the organ-
ization. Policy and strategy theorists looked to work process and measurement. In a
sense, the theories still tended to fall into the two classes that had emerged long before:
those that focused on people versus those that focused on tasks and structures.
4
More high-performance studies are likely to emerge in the future,

partly because the business environment continues to shift and partly
because the science of analysis continues to improve.
There were advances in both areas. In 1974, for example, Ralph Stogdill wrote that
“four decades of research on leadership have produced a bewildering mass of findings
…the endless accumulation of empirical data has not produced an integrated under-
standing of leadership.” But by the 1990s, Bernie Bass had published new work showing
that transactional and transformational leadership can be found across all parts of the
globe and in all forms of organizations. Further, transformational leader behaviors were
shown to relate positively to organizational performance.
A wealth of data also emerged to show the impact of individual worker behavior
on factors such as turnover, absenteeism, and unhealthy lifestyles. Likewise, wise manage-
ment of employees became more widely accepted as a way of boosting productivity and
decreasing operating expense (Cascio and Wynn 2004).
W. Edwards Deming looked more at tasks and processes. After decades of boost-
ing the success of corporations in Japan, Deming (1986) became a major management
force in the U.S. He identified various organizational “diseases” that caused U.S. industry
to go into decline, and he argued that 95% of all errors in organizations could be
attributed to the systems under which people worked rather than to people themselves.
The quality movement in the U.S., which emerged in the 1980s, is directly attributed
to Deming.
After the quality movement, organizations adopted other tools and technologies
to assist them in developing and maintaining high performance. Six Sigma, computer
technology, and “just-in-time” inventory management are examples that shaped
planning and work processes in ways that substantially reduced cost or improved
time-to-market, customer satisfaction, and the like.
Comparing and Measuring Performance

In 1982, when Tom Peters and Bob Waterman produced In Search of Excellence, the
idea of comparing, identifying, and analyzing the best-performing organizations came
into vogue (Kirby 2005). Since that time, many studies have used comparison techniques
to try to tease out what sets high-performance organizations apart. For example, in
Built to Last, Jim Collins (1994) took a somewhat similar approach.
But the goal of identifying the most durable high performers through the art of
comparison is a difficult one to achieve. One of the problems is that maintaining high
performance is a major challenge for any organization. While U.S. business professionals
bought In Search of Excellence and Built to Last in droves, many of the profiled companies
were unable to sustain high performance. Foster and Kaplan, in their book Creative
5
Destruction, make a strong case that surviving is not the same thing as performing.
Over the last decade about half of the Built to Last companies have not been able to
sustain a high-performance level—roughly the same percentage of In Search of
Excellence companies that struggled in the decade following the publication of Peters’
and Waterman’s best-selling book.
Even though the “right” method to determine high performance has not surfaced,
the quest to find it continues. In 2007, for instance, James Neelankavil and Debra
Comer published the results of a large study in which they analyzed the annual rankings
of companies according to the four performance criteria used by Fortune to determine
the best of the best (return on investment/equity, net profits, total assets, and revenues
dimensions).
There are also ongoing debates about how to measure corporate performance
among corporations. For example, are total assets or return on investments truly the
best measures of performance in an age when so much market value seems to stem
from “intangibles”? These sorts of debates are increasing among economists, consultants,
and business professionals.
There are also debates about the most important metrics within companies.
Kaplan and Norton (1992) are known for saying, “What you measure is what you get.”
They are the creators of the “balanced scorecard,” a system in which measurements are
meant to drive performance. Davenport and Harris, authors of Competing on Analytics
(2007), suggest that organizations will increasingly use data as a competitive advan-
tage. They argue that the frontier for using data is not just in measurement but also in
identifying the most profitable customers, determining the right price, accelerating
product innovation, optimizing supply chains, and identifying the true drivers of
financial performance (2007).
More high-performance studies are likely to emerge in the future, partly because
the business environment continues to shift and partly because the science of analysis
continues to improve. As Julia Kirby (2005) argued in the Harvard Business Review,
today’s management experts are still building on one another’s work, developing more
sophisticated survey instruments, mining richer data with better tools, and creating
theories with greater explanatory powers about high performance.
But if history provides a lesson, it is that no single factor or metric guarantees
organizational success. Rather, high performance is a composite of many things.
Practicing managers have much to learn from high-performance research, but they
should beware of easy answers that promise long-term high performance.
6
External Factors
Influencing Organizational
Performance
This section highlights the primary factors that

drive businesses to focus on and attain high
performance.
7
The external factors that influence organizational performance range from the skill
level of the labor force to the nature of today’s business environment. Of course, these
elements are dynamic, not only influencing the need for organizational performance
today but affecting how businesses will strive for peak performance in the future.
Before we describe external factors of importance, it is important to mention
that we do not discuss in this section theoretical models that attempt to describe and
explain high performance in organizations, ground that was covered in the previous
section. However, it should be noted that theories of high performance continue to
emerge and evolve, influencing how organizational members view such performance
and the strategies that can be adopted for attaining such performance.
Talents and Skills of the Workforce

If businesses are to become high-performance organizations, they must have employ-
ees who possess the right skills, abilities, and mindsets. When sufficient numbers of
appropriately skilled workers cannot be found or trained, organizational performance
is bound to suffer.
In 2006, about 9 out of 10 U.S. manufacturers polled by the National Association
of Manufacturers (NAM) said that they couldn’t find enough skilled workers to fill the
jobs needed to run their shops. In fact, NAM reported that some 80% of its member
manufacturers declared the shortage of skilled workers dire enough to adversely affect
their production schedules (Williams 2007).
Research from Sirota Survey Intelligence (2006) found that recruiting concerns
go far beyond the manufacturing sector. Its poll of HR professionals in 2006 found 64%
identifying recruiting as their leading challenge. Sixty-eight percent predicted the situa-
tion would continue at least through 2009. Also in 2006, Watson Wyatt reported that its
poll of 1,100 employees and 262 organizations across the U.S. found 63% of employers
admitting that they had problems finding workers with skills their firms needed.
Keeping skilled employees onboard can be problematic, too. Thirty-nine percent
of respondents to the Watson Wyatt (2006) poll identified retention of qualified workers
as a major issue for their organizations.
Talent shortages are not limited to U.S. employers. “In both developed and
developing countries, the evolving workforce is creating a talent shortage,” declared an
April–May 2007 article in Chief Executive. The publication pointed to aging and retir-
ing Baby Boomers as one underlying cause of the dwindling talent pool, adding that
rapid and extensive growth in developing nations has also contributed. It argues,
based on information from the U.S. Department of Commerce, that three-fifths of the
new jobs in this century will need skills that only about a fifth of today’s U.S. workers
have. “Clearly,” it reports, “it’s time for talent to be viewed as a significant issue in
boardrooms worldwide” (Appel 2007).
Echoing the international concern about finding skilled talent, nearly 3 out of
10 employers worldwide said they would have hired more workers last year but were
unable to find qualified applicants. A Manpower, Inc., survey included nearly 32,000
employers in 26 countries. In the Americas, problems were greatest in Peru, where
46% of employers reported a shortage of qualified workers. Canadian firms fared
8
best with challenges noted by only 26% of organizations. Forty-five percent of U.S.
firms said their hiring would have been greater if skilled applicants had been available.
In Asia, about a third of employers reported recruitment problems, though as many as
45% had trouble with staffing in Japan. Europe, the Middle East and Africa fared bet-
ter, with South African employers reporting the greatest hiring difficulties (37% of
employers) (Manpower, Inc., 2006).
Workers’ influence on organizational performance is undeniably crucial. A
Hewitt Associates study of 100 large U.S. companies in 2006 concluded that those
with formal programs in place to identify and develop skilled workers and high-
performance talent consistently achieved higher rates of shareholder return (Zielinski
2006). Further, 45% of 251 executives of global firms polled by Accenture the same
year identified finding and keeping skilled workers as an important driver of their
firms’ financial performance (Accenture 2006).
Finally, an April 2007 talent management survey conducted by the Institute for
Corporate Productivity found that among the most important drivers of talent man-
agement are the need to execute strategies, stay competitive in the marketplace, serve
customers well, and drive innovation—all elements inherent in high performance.
Global Competition
The fact that the majority of organizations participating in the AMA/Institute for
Corporate Productivity survey detailed in this report classified themselves as global or
multinational in scope speaks to the influence of globalization in today’s business
world. The global economy and, with it, global competition are growing at a fast clip.
The Society for Human Resource Management declared in 2007 that “since
2001, the global economy grew at a rate faster than at any point in the last 45 years.”
Newsweek International editor Fareed Zakara added that China and India, alone, have
contributed significantly to the world’s trade, accounting for the addition of an esti-
mated “2 billion to 3 billion new producers, consumers, and capitalists” (Smith 2007).
That globalization exercises a direct effect on organizational performance was
acknowledged by leaders of global firms in a 2006 Accenture poll. Sixty-one percent
of the 251 executives surveyed worldwide called the ability to capture a greater share
of the market a vital driver of their firms’ financial performance (Accenture, 2006).
Similarly, authors Atul Vashistha and Eugene Kublanov observe that leading organiza-
tional globalization initiatives can position firms for success across multiple business
units. The two suggest viewing international expansion as “growth and quality
improvement opportunities” as well as a mechanism for transforming such factors
as company structure, process design, communications, capabilities, and more
(Vashistha and Kublanov 2006).
Business expansion across international borders logically opens doors to new
markets, but it also opens organizations to new competitors—a double-edged sword for
some companies. Indeed, in 2006, The Ken Blanchard Companies’ 2006 Corporate Issues
Survey found more than 6 out of 10 HR and training professionals at international
organizations called competition their firms’ greatest challenge and the pressures attendant
to it the year’s top issue (The Ken Blanchard Companies 2006).
9
…agility and resilience are likely to be characteristics of organizations

that sustain (high) performance over long periods of time.
At the same time, many executives have recognized the opportunities inherent in
increased global competition for customers. Maintaining a strong customer focus and
responding to changing markets were cited as important drivers of financial performance
by executives polled by Accenture (2006).
The competitive landscape exerts an influence on corporate structure, in turn
affecting organizations’ abilities to align their structures with their strategies. In 2006,
balanced scorecard experts Robert S. Kaplan and David P. Norton looked at structural
change and resource alignment to support strategic execution, making the point that the
advent of global competition heralded a shift in corporate structure from centralization
around products or locations to a more process-centered and flexible model. Some
experts have labeled these flexible businesses as “Velcro” organizations, alluding to their
ability to separate and rejoin organizational components into various configurations.
Kaplan and Norton (2006) note that today’s organizations are challenged by the
fact that intangible assets, such as knowledge workers and research and development, are
playing an increasing role in corporate success, and by the fact that globalization has dis-
persed those assets worldwide. These factors are driving companies to get better at align-
ing both physical and intellectual resources, internally and externally, around the world.
Faster and More Disruptive Change

The pace of change is becoming both faster and more disruptive, according to results
from the AMA/HRI Building Organizational Agility and Resiliency Survey 2006. The
vast majority (82%) of 1,472 respondents reported that the pace of change experi-
enced by their organizations had increased compared with five years previously, and a
majority (69%) said that their organizations had experienced disruptive change—that
is, severe surprises or unanticipated shocks—over the previous 12 months
(AMA/HRI, 2006).
An analysis of the survey results also found that companies that, according to
self-reports, perform better in the marketplace are also more likely than their low-
performance counterparts to view themselves as agile and resilient, see “change as an
opportunity,” and view themselves as having better change capacities at the individual,
team, and organizational levels. Because such companies are more likely to say that
they “induce change and force others to react,” the pace of change is unlikely to slow
in the near future. There are simply too many high-performance organizations that
see change as a competitive advantage.
Therefore, agility and resilience are likely to be characteristics of organizations that
sustain performance over long periods of time. The AMA/HRI Building Organizational
Agility and Resiliency Survey 2006 defined resiliency as “the ability to absorb, react to,
10
and even reinvent who you are as a consequence of change” and agility as “the ability to
move quickly, decisively, and effectively in anticipating, initiating, and taking advantage
of change.” The research team on that report came to view agility and resiliency as
two sides of the same coin of “adaptive capacity,” or the capacity of organizations to
manage change.
Companies with high adaptive capacities will drive other organizations to perform
better in the future. Of course, being able to sustain over-average performance for
years at a time is a rare characteristic. The University of Minnesota Spencer Professor
of Strategic Management Alfred Marcus notes that just “3% of the 1,000 largest U.S.
corporations consistently and significantly outperformed their industry’s average”
between 1992 and 2002.
Yet, such companies are likely to have a disproportionate impact in terms of their
ability to make the business environment more disruptive and fast-paced. They tend to
share certain characteristics, according to Marcus. These include “profitable growth,
not growth at any cost,” innovation, flexibility, alliances with other organizations that
enable growth and help mitigate risk, an understanding of customers and their needs,
and a mastery of distribution channels (Marcus 2006).
Other studies have found other sets of change-friendly attributes. A 2007 survey
by Michigan-based Denison Consulting further quantified the benefits of a culture
able to respond quickly to change. Said research analyst Ryan Smerek, “Companies
that demonstrate higher levels of performance in key areas of organizational culture…
tend to deliver better results in return-on-assets, sales growth, and shareholder value.”
Smerek and his team analyzed data from 102 companies that responded to a Denison
culture survey over an 8-year period and assessed culture in terms of a firm’s adapt-
ability, consistency, mission, and involvement, examining such characteristics as customer
focus, change initiatives, team orientation, and company values. “Companies with the
best organizational culture scores earned an average return-on-assets of 6.3 percent,
vs. 4.5 percent for firms with the lowest organizational scores,” Smerek reported.
Top-scoring firms also achieved higher shareholder value: “market-to-book values of
440 percent as compared to 350 percent for firms with the lowest culture scores”
(Denison Consulting 2007).
As such companies thrive, their competitors are likely to try to imitate their
attributes and characteristics. This dynamic will make for an increasingly competitive
global business environment.
Technology
Technology and performance have been intertwined since the dawn of human civilization.
In learning to create and exploit new technologies, humankind has been able to powerfully
influence the world. Consider, for example, how the evolving understanding of heat and
combustion led to technologies such as metallurgical techniques, wood stoves, steam-
powered engines, coal-powered plants, electricity, automobiles, large-scale machinery,
and, eventually, most of what constitutes the modern workplace.
Try to imagine the performance levels of workers without such technologies.
How much could be accomplished by a single farmer without the advent of modern
11
farm equipment? How productive would construction workers be without trucks and
power tools and bulldozers? How many widgets could be manufactured without
machines?
The late historian Alfred Chandler showed how various technologies—from
the railroad to the cable—allowed companies to expand into enormous enterprises
that required professional management in order to perform well. And economic
historian Paul David has shown how new technologies can make organizations
much more productive, but only after they’ve learned how to best utilize those tech-
nologies. That’s why it took decades for enterprises to reap the benefits of electricity
and it has taken years for businesses to learn how best to harness computerization
(Harford 2007).
A March 2007 article on the New York Times Website mentions a 2007 report
on the role of technology in the U.S. economy that found that “money spent on com-
puting technology delivers gains in worker productivity that are three to five times
those of other investments.” Issued by the Information Technology and Innovation
Foundation, a research organization backed by IT companies, online auction site
eBay, and the Communications Workers of America, the study suggests that the
performance of certain industries—including health care, electric utilities, education
and transportation—could be raised through the wise use of information technology.
Not all economists are convinced that investments in technology have such a
large payoff, however. “It could be that investments here pay off more than other
investments, but the evidence is still not in, in my view,” noted economist Robert E.
Litan of the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation (Lohr 2007).
Other studies suggest that technology can be a double-edged sword, actually
reducing performance when it’s misused. Sixty percent of contact-center professionals
surveyed in 2005 said, for example, that technology problems were the main reason for
low productivity in their organizations. Four out of five also said technology problems
negatively impacted the customer’s experience. Surprisingly, 54% of the respondents
said their callers were the ones who told them about the technology problems. Only
10% of the respondents reported having any methods in place for testing their own
automated systems. In some industries, up to 80% of calls are handled by automated
systems, so technology problems can have a major effect on efficiency and quality of
service (“4 Out of 5,” 2005).
Future technologies are likely to show the same patterns, raising performance
levels when used well but hindering performance when used poorly. Radio frequency
identification (RFID), for example, has the potential to save firms significant amounts
of money along the supply chain. A 2006 report by the International Labour
Organization (2006) goes so far as to predict that RFID will eliminate “routine ware-
housing tasks” and that the technology could save the retailer Wal-Mart $8.35 billion
annually by 2020.
Many other types of technology—from robotics to biotechnology to nanotech-
nology—promise to boost the performance of individuals and organizations in
coming decades. But only time will tell how successfully organizations can leverage
these technologies to their competitive advantage.
12
The keys to managing threats and opportunities are the ability to

plan proactively, craft industry alliances, and stay informed about
social and political trends. (Bonini, Mendonca, and Oppenheim 2006)
Political and Regulatory Changes

As most employers understand, laws and regulations can have a major impact on their
businesses. In fact, respondents to the AMA/HRI Strategy Execution Survey 2006 saw
government regulations as a major barrier to the execution of organizational strategy,
second only to a scarcity of resources. Moreover, those respondents expected government
regulations to remain one of the top barriers to execution 10 years into the future.
Some other surveys corroborate the importance of regulations. Thirty-six
percent of the global leaders who participated in a 2006 Accenture survey called their
firms’ responses to regulations a top driver of financial performance. Similarly, in
2006, nearly two-thirds of 1,400 senior leaders in international businesses told
PricewaterhouseCoopers that changing regulatory environments was the biggest
obstacle they faced in guiding their organizations to success (Scalfane 2006).
But it isn’t just regulations that affect organizational performance. In a global
marketplace, the political makeup of nations can often determine success or failure in
a given region. In fact, political instability topped the list of risks threatening global
organizations on Aon Corporation’s 2006 Political & Economic Risk Map, a ranking
of countries based on factors including politics, civil unrest, terrorism, regulatory
issues, and other matters. The firm ranked legal and regulatory issues immediately
behind political concerns (Aon Corporation 2006).
Sociopolitical issues across the world have become increasingly important to
businesses for two reasons. First, of course, is globalization itself. Second, some
argue that political issues are more dynamic today than they were several decades
ago, and the global media bring them to the world’s attention more quickly.
Moreover, the relations between and among nations have become more complex in
recent years. “The challenge,” according to McKinsey & Co. executives, “is to find a
way for companies to incorporate an awareness of sociopolitical issues more sys-
tematically into their core strategic decision-making processes,” recognizing that
such issues can present not only risks but opportunities as well. The keys to manag-
ing threats and opportunities are the ability to plan proactively, craft industry
alliances, and stay informed about social and political trends (Bonini, Mendonca,
and Oppenheim 2006).
The Influence of Ethics

Do organizations that make a commitment to ethical operations perform better?
In 2006, Baylor University professors and two of five coauthors of “Ethical Attitudes
in Small Business and Large Corporations”—a survey sent to 10,000 U.S. business
13
If organizations are going to get the discretionary behaviors from

individuals which are so important to business performance, they
must work to create supportive cultures which encourage innovation
and performance.” (“The Stat,” 2005, p. 15)
professionals in 1985, 1993, and 2001—concluded that an ethical atmosphere in an

organization was good for efficiency and the bottom line. Their reasoning was that
ethical attitudes tend to translate into ethical behavior, in turn enabling those who
deal with the organization to develop trust in the system. A lack of trust in an organi-
zation’s fair dealing means all transactions must be monitored more closely, which
takes time and drives up costs (Shaw 2006).
According to a 2005 white paper by ISR, research from DePaul University showed
that companies with a strong, public commitment to ethics had a higher market value
than organizations that had no ethics policy and also than organizations that adopted
an ethics code and did nothing else. Those with a public commitment to ethics had an
added market value of $10.6 billion. Companies that had adopted an ethics code and
did nothing else had an added market value of $8.1 billion. Those organizations that
had no code had the lowest added market value—$3.24 billion (“Making,” 2006).
Research by the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD)
in 2005 also spoke to an ethics/performance connection, concluding that companies
with well-developed corporate value systems tend to perform better if those values
are inculcated into the sense of purpose employees bring to their work. “To deliver
effective performance, organizations need to work hard to create a shared vision and
values among their people,” said Angela Baron of CIPD. “Mission statements and strate-
gic decrees from on high are not enough. People need to feel a sense of purpose which is
reflected in a positive environment. If organizations are going to get the discretionary
behaviors from individuals which are so important to business performance, they must
work to create supportive cultures which encourage innovation and performance”
(“The Stat,” 2005, p. 15).
A reputation as an ethical company can also serve as a magnet for top talent.
Stanford University surveyed 800 MBA students from 11 North American and European
business schools in 2005, asking each to rank attributes they deemed important factors
in making employment choices. The students’ third-place choice—cited by 77% of
respondents—was a potential employer’s reputation for ethics and caring, leading
researchers to conclude that companies seen as highly ethical and with a reputation
for social responsibility may have an edge in recruiting the top talent needed to drive
organizational performance (Weber 2005).
Various scholars have focused on what some business professionals see as a trade-
off between a focus on the bottom line and a focus on ethics and social responsibility.
14
In a 2005 article, Ivey Business School Professor of Strategy Pratima Bansal argues
that “there does not have to be a tradeoff between economics and ethics.” Bansal notes,
“There is a compelling business case for firms to operate in the overlapping space where
activities are both financially profitable and socially and environmentally responsible.
In this middle ground, firms reduce costs, mitigate risks, protect their reputations,
stimulate innovation, and find new, sustainable sources of economic well-being”
(Bansal 2005). In short, ethical and socially responsible actions can, when undertaken
wisely, help an organization optimize its performance.
Environmental Changes
The idea that the natural environment is a factor in organizational performance is a
new and still controversial one. The so-called sustainability paradigm assumes that a
company should be not only financially sustainable but socially and environmentally
sustainable as well. Some are calling this the “triple bottom line.” The underlying idea
is that in a highly integrated, global business system, the long-term performance of
organizations will be based on the long-term health of societies and the natural environ-
ments on which they rely.
Others see the issue in simpler and starker terms. “Environmental matters have
financial, operational, and reputational impacts,” declared a February 2007 article in
London’s International Financial Law Review. The publication advises that “irrespec-
tive of whether one accepts the socio-moral argument that companies have an ethical
obligation towards the environment, a proactive approach to environmental risk
management is essential because failure to comply with environmental regulation
(or to adequately respond to environmental risks) can have big financial implications”
(“It’s Not Easy,” 2007).
A specific exploration into the relationship between compliance with environ-
mental management standard ISO 14001 and business performance was the focus of
a 40-organization study in 2006. Participating firms reported their procedures for
compliance with the standard, leading researchers to conclude that “standardization
of the organization’s handling of environmental issues [leads] to better organizational
environmental performance…and a positive impact on employee discretion.” However,
the study did not find any evidence supporting better business performance resulting
from compliance with the ISO standard (Link and Naveh 2006).
Rumblings about environmental changes and organizational responsibilities aside,
some quantification of such concerns as they impact business leaders was provided
by a 2007 survey conducted by the Institute for Corporate Productivity. The research
concluded that “environmental issues are not yet seen as issues that drive or will drive
key business decisions to any major extent.” This isn’t to say, however, that many
environmental issues will not become much more important over time. Indeed, due
to compliance requirements as well as social pressures, organizations’ performance
might well come to rely, at least in part, on their ability to effectively implement “green
practices.”
15
Characteristics of
High-Performance Organizations
This section presents the characteristics of

high-performance organizations. First, we present
a model of high-performance organizations.
Second, we look at data from the AMA/Institute
for Corporate Productivity High-Performance
Organization Survey 2007 to see how well it
supports the model and to detail approaches that
are correlated with high performance.
16
Of course, every organization is unique, and this applies to methods of managing and
sustaining high performance. Each of the high-performance companies in our study
uses its own particular blend of approaches, and this is as it should be. Executives in
any organization can and should select the approaches most suitable to their particular
organization based on their market situation, their strategy, and their people.
But the composite survey results revealed in this section provide a broad per-
spective of the many ways that organizations manage their performance. Just as we
can characterize the composite training methods of high-performance professional
athletes, we can report the results of how the best organizations operate and succeed.
And, like professional athletes’ training regimes, the regimens of high-performance
organizations show us the many ways to gain success. As aspiring athletes can pick
and choose from the composite regimen of professional athletes to best fit their sport,
body type, and physical abilities, so can executives and managers choose from our
composite results for high-performance organizations.
A Model of High-Performance Organizations

We have seen in the literature review section of this paper that there is considerable
history and theory behind the notion of high-performance organizations. From this
theory and from close analysis of successful business practice, experts have derived
various principles of high performance.
From Weber, for example, come insights about the importance of organizational
structure and processes. Drucker and Van de Ven point out the need to align behavior
and strategy. Deming highlights the virtues of measuring people, processes and out-
comes. From such literature, we have developed a model of performance that centers
on five major characteristics of organizations.
The first of these areas is strategic approach. We posit that an organization’s
consistency of strategic approach helps determine its success. This consistency can be
measured to see how well the organization “walks the talk.” High-performance organi-
zations tend to establish clear visions that are supported by flexible and achievable
strategic plans. They also have clearly articulated philosophies that set the standards
for everyone’s behavior. In addition, they have leaders, managers, and employees who
behave consistently with the strategic plan and the company’s philosophy.
The second major characteristic is tied to customer approach—that is, how a
company treats its customers. High-performance organizations tend to have clear
approaches to obtaining new customers, treating current customers, and retaining
customers. They also build the necessary infrastructure and processes to support their
customer approach.
Third is the leadership approach. This describes the organization’s strategy in
managing people to achieve a particular set of behaviors. High-performance organiza-
tions tend to be clear about what behaviors employees must exhibit to execute the
organization’s and departmental strategies. Executives and managers set clear goals,
understand employees’ abilities, and guide their performance.
Fourth are processes and structure. This captures how organizations arrange
their work processes, policies, and procedures to support and execute strategy.
17
High-performance organizations have processes that reinforce strategy, setting up

work flows and tasks that most effectively enable employees to meet internal and
external customer needs within the limits of the strategy. Such companies tend to use
a wide variety of metrics to gauge the work for each department and the organization
as a whole.
Fifth are values and beliefs. These are essential to helping a company execute its
strategy and achieve its mission. High-performance organizations typically have a set
of well-established values that are the deep drivers of employee behavior and are well
understood by the vast majority of the employees. The values and beliefs are embedded
in the organization and are consistent with the company’s approach to leadership.
An extensive review of the research indicates that these five factors are the major
drivers that influence organizational performance. Each interacts with and influences
the others, creating a whole system. A change to one creates changes in the others.
Subsequently, the system tends to be in continual flux. The interactions among these
five characteristics are illustrated in the model below.
INTERACTIVE COMPONENTS OF
HIGH-PERFORMANCE ORGANIZATIONS
Strategic
Approach
Customer Leadership
Approach Approach
Processes & Values &

Structure Beliefs
From Overholt, Granell, Vicere, Jargon 2006
One way to think about how a system is continually shifting is to picture a sailing
vessel. A sailboat is a system made up of various crucial components, among them the
helm (or steering wheel), the rudder, which is controlled by the helm, the boom,
which is attached to the sail, the sail itself, and the sheets (or lines) that control the
boom. These components must work together as a system or the vessel as a whole will
fail. The wind is analogous to changes in the market and these components are like
the five major drivers of organizational performance. If the rudder and the helm
become disconnected, there will be no steerage. If the sheets become disconnected
from the boom or the sail becomes disengaged from the boom, then the vessel can no
longer use the air currents around it. Instead, it becomes a foundering victim to the
forces of sea and wind.
18
As any sailor knows, moving as planned through the sea means always account-
ing for the direction and the velocity of the wind, the length of the sheets, the cut of
the sail, the currents in the water, and the angle of the rudder. As the sailor goes
forward, he or she is simultaneously adjusting these components to harness the wind
and accommodate the sea, continually rebalancing the components to maintain an
essential harmony among them.
This is the underlying problem and challenge in high-performance organiza-
tions. The executives must know how to move their organizations forward while bal-
ancing the parts of the system. Executives in high-performance organizations follow the
direction of the wind and water (market changes), using them to their advantage as
they guide their organizations onward.
High Performance in Practice: What the Survey Data Tell Us

To test this high-performance model and identify how high-performance companies
achieve success, the AMA/Institute for Corporate Productivity team conducted a
global survey to which 1,369 companies responded. The AMA/Institute for Corporate
Productivity High-Performance Organization Survey 2007 analysis then grouped
respondents into three categories, based on their responses to market performance
questions that focused on revenue growth, market share, profitability, and customer
satisfaction.
Based on those self-reports, respondents were placed into three categories:
lowest performers, mid-level performers, and highest performers. The team then
compared the highest performers to the lowest performers on key attributes within
the five areas detailed above: strategic approach, customer approach, leadership
approach, processes and structures, and values and beliefs.
The results reveal which attributes are stronger in high-performance organiza-
tions than in less-well-performing organizations. Overall, of the 79 total attributes, 64
were found to be positively correlated with high performance. Thus, the results paint a
compelling picture of how high-performance organizations achieve their success.
Strategic Approaches: Consistent, Clear and Well Thought Out

In the area of strategic approach, consistency is important to high performance, the
survey data indicate. The common wisdom of “walk the talk” is an indispensable
ingredient in high-performance organizations. Most people judge the truth of what
an individual says by matching it to his or her behavior. If an executive, for example,
says one must behave consistently with the company’s strategy or philosophy and then
behaves inconsistently, employees draw a variety of conclusions, most of them
destructive to an organization:
• Do not believe what he or she says.
• We are allowed to behave the way the executive does
(or we can pick and choose which rules to follow).
• The rules do not apply to everyone (or anyone) and
therefore we are allowed to do whatever we wish.
19
Executives in high-performance organizations

HOW DO HIGH-PERFORMANCE avoid these problems by ensuring that employ-
ORGANIZATIONS
APPROACH STRATEGY? ees are clear about the strategic plan and the
Most Widely Used Practices
company’s approach to business and by ensur-
• Organization’s philosophy statement is
ing that managers behave consistently. On all
consistent with its strategy. 12 survey attributes that measure consistency
• Respondents know what they need to of strategic approach, the high-performance
know about their organization’s strategy organizations scored higher than the lower
in order to do their jobs effectively. performers. The survey assessed employees’
• The basic theme of the organization’s understanding of the company strategy and
philosophy statement matches
respondents’ personal philosophy. philosophy as well as the degree to which
behavior is consistent with strategy and philos-
Practices Where High Performers ophy. All 12 attributes are positively correlated
Furthest Outstrip Low Performers
to high performance.
• Organization-wide performance measures
match the organization’s strategy. Consistency of leadership is only
• Organization’s strategic plan is clear and a part of the equation. The AMA/Institute for
well thought out. Corporate Productivity High-Performance
• Employees act in ways that are consistent Organization Survey 2007 shows that the single
with the behaviors needed to execute the most widely cited strategic practice among
strategic plan.
high-performance organizations was, “My
organization’s philosophy statement is consis-
tent with its strategy.” And the strategic practice in which high performers outstrip low
performers the most is “Organization-wide performance measures match the organiza-
tion’s strategy,” followed by “Organization’s strategic plan is clear and well thought out”
(see Appendix, Table 23).
These findings indicate that high performance is not related just to consistency
of leadership behaviors but to its consistency with the overall philosophy of the
organization. Leaders come and go, but philosophy tends to be more stable. Strategies
should be aligned with these philosophies as well as with performance measures.
Consistency is not enough, however. The great American poet Ralph Waldo
Emerson once wrote, “A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by
little statesmen and philosophers and divines.” High-performance organizations must
make sure that their consistency isn’t “foolish,” which is why ensuring that a strategic
plan is “well thought out” is so strongly associated with market success. No company
can perform well if poor leaders devise poorly conceived strategies, even when those
strategies are consistently implemented.
Customer Approaches: Going Above and Beyond

Customers are crucial to nearly any line of business, but what kind of customer
approaches are most effective to establishing high performance? To find out, the
AMA/Institute for Corporate Productivity High-Performance Organization Survey 2007
included 12 questions about how respondents view customers, treat customers, and
are organized to meet the needs of their customers. The data reveal that all 12 of the
customer-related questions are positively correlated with high performance.
20
Specifically, the results indicate that high-

HOW DO HIGH-PERFORMANCE performance organizations tend to be more attuned to
ORGANIZATIONS
APPROACH CUSTOMERS? the current and future needs of their customers than
Most Widely Used Practices
low-performance organizations. High performance is
• Organization believes that the business
also associated with a very strong emphasis on customer
exists primarily to serve customers. service, including vigorous efforts to serve customers
• Organization strives to be the best in better than anyone else in the industry. The survey also
the world in providing value for its best found high performance is linked with the use of “cus-
customers. tomer information as the most important factor related
• Organization assesses and determines its to developing new products and services” (see Appendix,
customers’ future needs.
Table 25). In short, high-performance companies have—
Practices Where High Performers and act on—foresight in regard to their customers.
Furthest Outstrip Low Performers High-performance firms also understand that differ-
• Organization uses customer information ent customers have different needs and that some cus-
as the most important factor for
developing new products and services. tomers add more to the bottom line than others. Such
• Organization accurately targets its organizations create different types of processes to manage
customers’ long-term needs. different categories of customers and they are attuned to
• Organization exceeds customers’ shifts in the market that require them to change how they
expectations. treat customers. In general, they are more outwardly
focused on customer needs and behavior than low-perfor-
mance organizations.
The survey questions and responses in this area can also be grouped into three
major categories:
1. External focus: In general, high-performance organizations are more willing
than other organizations to hear what is best for the customer rather than what is best
for the organization.
2. Philosophical approach: High-performance organizations intend to be the
“best in the world” in providing value and exceeding customer expectations. These are
not just lofty words or statements, some research shows, but rather actions that are put
into practice. As with strategic approaches, high-performance companies are more likely
than other organizations to “walk their talk” in terms of customer focus.
3. Internal design: High-performance organizations also tend to be better at
creating and maintaining internal processes that best meet the needs of the customer.
Their customer-focused processes are also more flexible than those in low-performance
organizations and leave room for employees to use their judgment in meeting customer
needs.
Leadership Approaches: Focused on Performance, Beliefs, and Talent

Leadership—especially at the CEO level—is frequently portrayed as the key ingredient
in creating a successful organization, but the larger research suggests this can be over-
stated. Research conducted by Nitin Nohria and colleagues at Harvard Business School
found, for example, that on average, 14% of a firm’s performance is dependent on its
leader (“Creating,” 2003).
Leadership is only one of five key components of organizational systems that
21
must operate in a kind of mutual harmony to be effective. However, in today’s superstar-

focused culture, executives and leaders are what most business writers tend to focus on
first. People are acculturated to emulate the superstar, to be just like him or her.
The AMA/Institute for Corporate Productivity High-Performance Organization
Survey 2007 asked participants 11 questions about their organizational approach to
leading. The research team found that one of the most widely agreed-on leadership-
related strategies is ensuring that “everyone is clear about the organization’s perform-
ance expectations.” About two-fifths of respondents either strongly or very strongly
agreed that their organizations do this (see Appendix, Table 26), and high-perfor-
mance organizations were considerably
more likely than low-performance organiza-
HOW DO HIGH-PERFORMANCE
ORGANIZATIONS tions to say this. In fact, of the 11 leader-
APPROACH LEADERSHIP? related strategies asked about in the survey,
Most Widely Used Practices this was the one in which higher performers
• Immediate supervisor understands the furthest outstripped lower performers.
strengths respondents bring to their jobs. Another important factor associated
• Employees believe that their behavior with high performance is “making sure
affects the organization. employees believe that their behavior affects
• Everyone is clear about the organization’s the organization.” Leaders can’t do their jobs
performance expectations.
alone. They must be able to convince others
Practices Where High Performers of just how important their own behaviors
Furthest Outstrip Low Performers are to the success of the whole organization.
• Everyone is clear about the organization’s A third factor that was strongly
performance expectations.
associated with performance was the idea
• Management promotes the person who
has the best skills and knowledge to do that “management promotes the person who
the job. has the best skills and knowledge to do the
• Employees believe that their behavior job.” It appears that performance tends to be
affects the organization. higher in organizations where promotions
are based on talent and merit rather than on
other factors, such as organizational politics.
The leadership-behavior survey questions can also be analyzed from a broader
perspective that is based on the high-performance paradigm set out above. The questions
can be grouped into three major categories:
1. Supervisory relationship: For over 50 years, organizational researchers
have found that the most important relationship within any organization is the one
between the employee and his immediate supervisor. A good relationship between
employee and supervisor is associated with high-performance, more safety-conscious
behavior, better physical health, and higher employee satisfaction. Not surprisingly,
the best-performing organizations in the survey scored higher than lower in all the
questions related to this area, including employee comfort with being able to express
disagreement.
2. Innovation in HR: The survey also found that high-performance organiza-
tions had more innovative HR than the low-performance organizations. Their HR
functions bring new approaches to people management so they are continually aware
22
of what other companies are doing to more effectively manage people.

3. Clarity of goals and consistency of rewards: As noted above, high-performance
companies are clear and consistent in the area of performance expectations, and they
also tend to be more consistent in the ways they reward workers. They set clear perform-
ance expectations, reward employees who have the best ability, and reward those
employees who strive to best meet customer needs.
In short, clarity and consistency are important in terms of strategy and
philosophy, customer focus, and leadership behaviors. These components mutually
reinforce each other, strengthening what we can term the “culture of performance”
by minimizing the destructive and nonproductive behaviors that are the result of
mixed messages.
Processes and Structure: Centered Around Metrics, Customers, and Training

Sometimes truisms are true, and this seems to be the case with the old adage, “You can’t
manage what you can’t measure.” The AMA/Institute for Corporate Productivity High-
Performance Organization Survey 2007 strongly indicates that clearly defined perform-
ance measures are a major key to success. Not only was the statement “my organization’s
performance measures are clearly defined” one of the most highly agreed to statements
among high-performance organizations, but it was the statement in this survey section in
which high-performance organizations outstripped low-
performance organizations the most.
ORGANIZATIONS APPROACH PROCESSES The survey found that other especially critical char-
AND STRUCTURE? acteristics associated with high performance are the fol-
Most Widely Used Practices lowing:
• Organization’s highest priorities are on 1. A strong focus on customers
meeting customers’ needs. 2. The kind of training and instruction
• Organization’s delivery schedules for that is necessary to do jobs well, and
products and services are based on 3. Keeping current with state-of-the-
customer needs.
market technological advances.
• Organization’s performance measures
are clearly defined. The first of these reinforces previous findings—that
is, there’s a strong relationship between high performance
Practices Where High Performers and customer focus. The second suggests that training and
skills play a strong part in high performance. And the
• Organization’s performance measures
are clearly defined. third of these points to the need to stay current with tech-
• Employees receive the training and nological advances, which clearly drive performance when
instruction necessary to do the job used wisely.
properly. The survey asked 24 questions in this section, twice
• Organization keeps current with state-of- the number in the first three sections. The high-perfor-
the-market technological advances.
mance organizations were rated higher on most of those
variables. The processes and structure questions and
responses can be grouped into four major categories to provide a broader perspective.
1. Information access: High-performance organizations understand the power
of good communication and of sharing information. Information is viewed as something
to be shared rather than something to be hoarded for the purpose of power and control.
23
High-performance organizations’ supervisors share information freely. In addition,

information pertinent to the job at hand is made readily available to employees.
2. Technology: Keeping abreast with technological advances is an ongoing
strategic concern. High-performance organizations are more likely to use state-of-the-
market technology than other organizations. And since such organizations are more
customer-focused than others, they also are more likely to use customer-relationship
management software than low-performance companies.
3. Performance measures: As noted above, high-performance organizations
leverage performance measures to drive clarity and focus throughout their organizations.
4. Customer focus: High-performance organizations are more aware of inter-
nal and external customer satisfaction than low-performance organizations. In
addition, high-performance organizations have processes than are more outwardly
focused than low-performance organizations.
Values and Beliefs: Upbeat, Ethical, and Ready for Challenges

Being seen as a “good place to work” is a solid indicator that an organization is a high
performer. Not only is the characteristic most widely cited by high-performance
organizations, it is also one of the areas in which those organizations furthest outstrip
low performers.
High-performance organizations are also well aware of external factors such as
customers, markets and competitors, and they are ready to take on new challenges.
Another factor that’s relatively strongly correlated with performance is a commitment
to innovation (see Appendix, Table 31).
The survey also asked respondents
about ethics. The research team found that
ORGANIZATIONS
fully 69% of responding organizations said
APPROACH VALUES AND BELIEFS? that their organizations adhered to the
Most Widely Used Practices highest ethical standards, and the percent-
• Most employees think the organization is age was higher for top performers. The high
a good place to work. positive response rate reflects the current
• The organization’s organizational culture is concern over ethical behavior in organiza-
externally focused on customers, markets, tions, and the data indicate a positive rela-
and competitors.
tionship between performance and ethics.
• The organization emphasizes readiness to
The values, beliefs, and ethics survey
meet new challenges.
questions can be grouped into four categories
Practices Where High Performers to provide a broader perspective.
1. Approach to work: In addition to
• The organization emphasizes a readiness
some of the values noted above, employees in
to meet new challenges.
high performance companies tend to be loyal
• A shared value that keeps the
organization together is commitment to to the company and they tend to participate in
innovation. their organization’s social events. They also
• Most employees think the organization is tend to be more involved and more comfort-
a good place to work. able with their companies.
2. How the organization treats its
24
employees: High-performance organizations create an environment that fosters cohe-

siveness, loyalty, and readiness to change. Such organizations tend to treat their
employees well, and employees, in turn, treat the organization well. These organiza-
tions also tend to be more concerned about their employees than the low-performance
organizations, and they tend to have employees who are able to find helpful, knowledge-
able opinions among their coworkers.
3. Employees have the freedom to use their judgment: In high-performance
organizations, employees have more freedom to use their own discretion than
employees do in low-performance organizations. Employees in these organizations
also have more liberty to change processes or procedures to improve outcomes.
Their supervisors have the same type of freedom. All of these changes are made
within a more cohesive group than in low-performance organizations. The feedback
loops minimize disruption and reduce confusion.
4. Ethics: As noted before, high-performance organizations tend to have a
stronger set of ethics-related values than the low-performance organizations.
The Context for High-Performance Organizations

Business leaders should keep in mind that, despite the fact that high-performance
companies tend to share many characteristics, there are many different strategic
approaches to the marketplace. This was supported by the results of the AMA/Institute
for Corporate Productivity High-Performance Organization Survey 2007, which asked
respondents to indicate what market strategies they were pursuing. (The question
used a modified Treacy and Wiersema [1995] model.)
Specifically, the questions identified four major market strategies: (1) competing
on low price, (2) competing by offering a set of products and/or services, (3) competing
by branding, and (4) competing by offering unique solutions. In essence, the research
team asked respondents what their companies’ value propositions were. The data indi-
cate that many companies pursue multiple value propositions. The research team’s con-
clusion from this finding is that companies in today’s highly competitive, globalized
markets need to be prepared to pursue multiple strategies as they adjust to different
markets.
Nonetheless, the survey does suggest that some
HOW DID RESPONDING COMPANIES
APPROACH THEIR value propositions are more likely than others to lead to
VALUE PROPOSITIONS?* high performance. Although it’s true that some of the
• Distinctive branded products or services— world’s most successful companies compete by offering
84%
low-priced products and services, this survey indicates that
• Products or services that are customized
offering “distinctive branded products and services” and
for specific customers—79%
“products and services that are customized for specific
• Lower-price products or services with
desirable extra features—31% customers” was more strongly associated with good mar-
• Lowest-price products and services—20% ket performance. It’s possible that, in a highly competi-
*Percentages derived from percentage of companies
tive global marketplace, maintaining a position as a low-
noting somewhat, strongly or very strongly agree. cost provider is increasingly difficult to achieve while
Multiple responses were accepted.
maintaining the kind of margins associated with high
performance. The value proposition that shows the
25
largest gap between higher and lower performers was “distinctive branded products or
services” (see Appendix, Table 13).
Summary of Results
As this section of the report has shown, there is no single secret to high performance.
Rather, successful organizations are dynamic systems with interdependent parts.
However, as the AMA/Institute for Corporate Productivity team reviewed and
digested the results of the AMA/HRI High-Performance Organizations Survey 2007,
we developed a short list of characteristics of high-performance organizations:
1. They “walk the talk,” behaving consistently throughout the organization.
2. They understand their customers to a very high degree, knowing what
customers need and focusing on meeting those needs.
3. They manage locally and yet share information; they develop and support
great supervisors and provide access to as much information as employees
can use.
4. They create an environment of focus and teamwork; they do this by designing
procedures and processes to pull everyone together and by clearly measuring
outcomes.
5. They treat employees well so that employees will treat the organization well;
they clarify values and expectations and they behave with the highest ethical
standards.
Organizations that share these characteristics are not guaranteed to be high per-
formers, but they stand a considerably better chance of performing well than if they
fail to adopt these traits.
26
High Performance
in the Year 2017
In this section, we describe a fictional corporation

that we’ve called the High-Performance
Organization Company, or HIPOC. We do this
in order to illustrate what we believe will be the
future characteristics of high-performance
organizations.
27
This interview is set in the year 2017 and incorporates ideas from the AMA/Institute for
Corporate Productivity team as well as from the High-Performance Organization Survey 2007.
Of course, we can’t be sure what future state-of-the-art execution programs will
look like, so these are only educated guesses about what approaches will work best in
10 years. Moreover, circumstances vary by company and industry, so not every feature
of the organization’s program will be applicable in every company.
Nonetheless, these kinds of exercises can help managers look beyond the daily
operational details of managing their organizations. The AMA/Institute for Corporate
Productivity research team encourages managers to engage in various strategic planning
methods—such as scenario planning—to help them gain a better understanding of
how their organizational performance programs could or should evolve.
Interview with Sara Ohmet, CEO of HIPOC
Proactive, Analytical, and Values-Driven

Reporter: We are speaking with Sara Ohmet, Chief Executive Officer at HIPOC.
Sara, HIPOC has gone through an unusually long period in which it has outperformed
the overall marketplace and direct competitors in its industry. Everyone would like to
know what your secret is, especially considering all the changes that have occurred
in the marketplace over the last decade.
Ohmet: I’d say we haven’t succeeded despite all those changes but because we’ve
successfully adapted to those changes.
Reporter: How so?
Ohmet: We’ve long emphasized looking outside the corporation. Too often,
organizations become inward-looking, but part of our culture is to focus a good
deal of our attention on external customers, markets, and competitors. This means
we aren’t surprised too often. We also stay abreast of the many other external factors
that influence organizational performance.
Reporter: Can you give us an example?
Ohmet: The talent in today’s labor force is a good example. Some of our businesses
require very specific skill sets, so we’ve become highly adept at determining where we can
locate such talent externally. We’ve developed strong professional networks that we man-
age and track via information systems. We even collect data from universities and other
educational institutions from all over the world to try to gauge where the top talent is
located. In a growing number of cases, we contract with specialists we meet through
Web-based and virtual-world-based communities.
We’ve found that the virtual world spaces make it especially easy to do this. In
some cases, we’ve been contracting multiperson avatars, in which several consultants
share an online body so that they can pool their expertise even while interacting with
us as a single, super-knowledgeable entity.
Reporter: I guess that adds a whole other meaning to “diverse workers.” Can you
hire as well as contract with these super employees?
28
Ohmet: Well, you’d actually be hiring an existing team of people, of course, which
we’ve sometimes done in the past. In a lot of cases, we hire people who we’ve worked
with as contractors. In fact, we encourage our up-and-coming talent to work outside
HIPOC for a while to gain a truly different perspective. This helps us maintain that
external focus.
Reporter: What other ways does HIPOC focus outwardly?
Ohmet: We understand that the world is a very innovative place and that much
of what we’ll need in the future has not been invented inside HIPOC. Therefore, we
have systems and processes to keep track of up-and-coming technologies. One of the
quickest ways to lose your competitive advantage is to ignore technological advances.
We have employees and networked systems dedicated to tracking new developments
and working to see how we might harness those technical advances.
But that doesn’t mean that we jump on every bandwagon. Too often, companies
adapt a technology just because it seems fashionable. In addition to using our standard
R&D processes and partnerships, we audition up-and-coming technologies through
what we call “quick trials”—in which a team quickly tries to apply a new technology
to specific problems we’re having.
Reporter: Some of your businesses are highly regulated. How do you deal with
that issue?
Ohmet: Again, we try to stay proactive and aware of what’s coming down the
pike. We’ve been known to lobby against proposed new laws that we consider onerous,
but that’s unusual for us. We generally try to stay ahead of laws and regulations that
we see as inevitable. For example, our manufacturing operations tend to be “greener”
than the law actually requires, and we’re much more safety and health conscious than
government regulations actually require.
Reporter: Your company seems to place a lot of emphasis on the concept of
health, doesn’t it?
Ohmet: Yes, we’re not just concerned with individual health but with organiza-
tional health. Our executive team refers to what we call the “quadruple bottom line.”
This is an extension of the triple bottom line concept, which looks at the financial,
social and environmental bottom lines of organizations. The fourth bottom line, in our
estimation, is how well we function as a system. That is, we rigorously measure how
well our different organizational components align with and work with one another.
We’ve even found a correlation between individual and organizational health. That
is, the better run we are, the healthier our employees seem to be. We have systems in place
that, in aggregate, try to measure the impact of organizational behavior on employees’
state of wellness. The underlying driver is based both on our organizational values and on
research showing that productivity can be increased by boosting the wellness of employ-
ees. It’s the right thing to do from both an ethical and analytical viewpoint.
Reporter: Measuring the impact of organizational behavior on individual well-
being sounds very complex and possibly legally risky. For example, a person’s well-being
is influenced by all kinds of factors, from genetics to upbringing to home life to individual
29
choices. Do you really want your organization to be held legally responsible for workers’
well-being?
Ohmet: Those are good points. Ultimately, of course, we don’t claim to have
perfect knowledge about people’s health or what’s influencing it. We’re looking more at
aggregate data of the sort that can help us improve the well-being of organizational
members. We are using the data to work on preventive health issues. So far, our legal
counsel hasn’t seen much risk in this for us, especially because our policies in this area are
so progressive when compared to what’s required by law.
Reporter: So, it sounds as if your organization derives large performance dividends
from being unusually analytical, proactive, alert to changes, and focused on the health
of your workers as well as your organization as a whole.
Ohmet: Those are definitely a part of the story.
Clear, Consistent, and Customer-Focused

Reporter: So what are the primary drivers of performance, in your opinion?
Ohmet: I’d say most of it comes down to what we call the internal three Cs:
clarity, consistency, and customers. We have to be clear about what we’re trying to
achieve and how, consistent in how we present those messages, and always focused
on needs of customers. There’s nothing new in any of this. Rather, it’s the way that we
achieve those goals that continues to evolve.
Reporter: Okay, so how have your approaches to customers, for example,
changed over the last 10 years?
Ohmet: Customers themselves have changed. They expect more, have more infor-
mation, and have more choices. They’re also a lot more demographically diverse than
they used to be, thanks to globalization.
All this changes the way we approach customers. We have to react faster to their
needs than we used to, be flexible enough to accommodate their more varied needs,
and be able to sell our products as socially and environmentally responsible. We involve
customers more in the innovation process, allow them to customize more, and have a
more integrated and a more responsive customer-service system.
We also interact with them on very different terms than we used to. Technology
mediates the customer relationship more than it used to but we still have to maintain
a personal touch. It’s a difficult challenge and we’re always thinking about how to do
it better.
Reporter: And how about clarity?
Ohmet: Clarity is about two things: Excellent strategy formulation and communi-
cation. Too often, managers think it’s all about communicating something clearly. But
that’s only a part of it. If you have a murky, messy strategy, you’re never going to be
able to make it clear, no matter how persistent you are. So our approach to clarity has
evolved over the last 10 years because there are new ways of formulating strategies, new
strategic approaches and new ways of communicating those strategies.
Reporter: Can you give an example of what you mean?
Ohmet: We are in businesses today that we weren’t even thinking about 10 years
30
ago. For example, we now make products for kids, largely because they became savvy
users of a modified high-tech product that was once reserved for adults.
Going after that market was a strategic decision that didn’t make much sense to
some of our adult-oriented employees at first. Leadership had to be clear about what
we were doing and why. And we had to be clear in our own minds about why this new
direction made sense.
Reporter: Well, it’s certainly paid off for you. How could employees fail to see
the potential?
Ohmet: That market was an unknown to them. We had to make sure people
understood how the strategy fit in with our mission, philosophy, and way of working.
So we communicated, clearly and often, in many different styles but always with a certain
consistency.
Reporter: So your customer base evolved but your philosophy stayed the same.
Ohmet: Our philosophy actually assumes a great deal of flexibility toward products
and customers. Today’s organizations have to reinvent themselves to be able to react to
what customers specifically want rather than to what organizations want to push out to
them. So, our philosophy has to be flexible even while it maintains a consistency.
Well Led and Resilient

Reporter: As you’ve become more global and have moved into other businesses,
how have you maintained your culture and values?
Ohmet: I think there are two answers. First, we needed terrific leadership.
Second, those leaders need to be very canny about processes and structure.
Let’s start with how leadership has changed. Today’s leaders have got to be
extremely network savvy compared to 10 or 20 years ago, and they have to be able to
motivate a much different workforce. They also must have plenty of global experience.
In our organization, many originally hail from nations outside the U.S. We even have
anthropologists involved in our leadership programs to help us understand and adjust
to cultural differences. We also have a very sophisticated global recruitment and
management database.
We work hard on managing all the different views that a multilingual and multi-
cultural workforce generates. Our leaders must be excellent at managing conflict, at
running the kinds of virtual meetings that surface good ideas and at gaining everyone’s
buy-in. And they must know when an issue needs to be handled locally or when it needs
to be coordinated on a regional or global basis.
Moreover, these leaders have to be excellent at creating organizational processes
and structures that are flexible but not chaotic, adaptive but not unstable. In recent
years, many organizations have lost their core. They’re little more than names on a
contract. They’re constantly hiring new leaders and entering entirely new businesses.
They merge, acquire, partner and network with abandon. But they’re virtually never
seen as great performers.
HIPOC, on the other hand, is intent on maintaining certain communication
31
processes and organizational structures that give us stability and yet resiliency over
time. Sometimes we joke that we’re like the proverbial yogi who can twist himself in
all kind of different shapes and yet maintain a healthy backbone. We’re most flexible
at the extremities, in the ways we interact with and serve our customers.
Involved with the Community

Reporter: Some experts argue that the boundaries between companies and com-
munities aren’t as separate as they once were, thanks to the success of the responsibility
movement over the last decade. What’s HIPOC’s take on these blurring boundaries?
Ohmet: Some of that is true for us as well. We link our internal three Cs—clarity,
consistency, and customers—with what we call the external three Cs: coordination,
collaboration, and community. We coordinate with the community representatives when
developing certain business plans, such as those involving building, waste management,
environmental restoration, energy sharing, and the like. We collaborate during the
implementation of those plans and keep in mind that we are, in fact, part of the larger
community.
Of course, like many other corporations these days, we gauge ourselves by using
a social responsibility index. Our scores clearly affect our stock price, and, therefore,
we take it very seriously.
We also have metrics that identify the quality of life in every location we are in.
These metrics help us assess the health of the community via data on the state of the
education system, crime rates, the quality of governmental services, poverty rates, and
many other social issues. Our premise is that there’s a positive feedback loop between
community health and our own corporate performance, and the data usually bears
this out.
This is why our plants and operations don’t move around as much as they used
to. Rather than downsizing and then shipping operations overseas, we usually just
expand into new regions. The temptation to move abroad for the sake of low-cost
labor—which we’ve done before—isn’t as strong now that there’s more global equity
in this area.
High Tech and High Touch

Reporter: I’ve heard you refer to HIPOC as a high-touch organization, which
is odd considering you’re a leader in various high-tech areas.
Ohmet: We know the limitations of high-tech. Don’t get me wrong. High-tech
communication is terrific and sometimes nearly miraculous. We use it all: team-based
surface computing, telepresence suites, holographic integration apps, massively multi-
player environments, and more. It’s all wonderfully useful for a global corporation like
ours, yet it can still feel distant and cold sometimes.
Ultimately we’re still people. We need some face-to-face interactions with
colleagues, especially when developing new products or solving difficult problems.
There’s just nothing like smart people together in the same room, batting around
ideas, sharing passions, establishing friendships. So, we make sure that they have
32
plenty of opportunities to work together. We have lots of satellite offices, volunteer

groups, brainstorming meetings, retreats, and the like.
We also encourage people to work with and within their local communities.
Small, personally connected groups can make a huge difference to improving neigh-
borhoods. Technology goes a long way toward mediating connections, but there’s
nothing like a neighborhood porch party for really getting to know folks.
All these high-touch initiatives become part of the culture. We want HIPOC to
be a great place and a safe place to work, both physically and emotionally. Our
employees then share this reality with our customers and the larger community.
Reporter: Do you apply the high-touch philosophy to customer relations?
Ohmet: We can’t possibly meet all our customers on a personal basis, of course,
but we do hold events where we meet with them personally. We could sell all of our
products and even many of our services online, but we don’t limit ourselves to online
selling. We rent space in various retailers and have our own stores in major metropolitan
areas, all in the name of connecting with our customers better.
We want to know what they’re thinking, how they’re using products, how strongly
they feel about our products. And we want to share our own passion with them. Having
a passion for the beauty and design of our products is important to us.
Reporter: Are there any downsides to forging personal relationships with
customers?
Ohmet: Well, one might be that you raise expectations. Employees, as individuals,
are not available 24/7, yet customers expect HIPOC to be available 24/7. So we’ve developed
teaming relationships that connect the customer with a team of our employees.
Reporter: But how does this make a customer feel a connection? Isn’t this just
an organization providing service through multiple faces?
Ohmet: Of course, we have information systems that tell us vast amounts about
our customers. There’s nothing new about that in terms of being able to pull up data
about buying habits, credit reports, previous purchases, and other things. But we’ve
gone the extra mile by giving them opportunities to voluntarily tell us things about
themselves, things that they don’t mind are in our computer systems: favorite colors,
hobbies, sports teams, musical tastes, and so forth.
This helps us understand them a bit as individuals even if we don’t know them
personally. And employees are trained in how to use this information in a way that
isn’t off-putting to customers. Most customers enjoy this process. The whole social
networking phenomenon of 10 years ago has now grown into connective software,
software that the customers themselves have helped write.
Transparent, Healthy, and Professionally Managed

Reporter: Any danger that your organization is becoming a bit too touchy feely
for today’s super competitive marketplace?
Ohmet: That’s a mistake our competitors sometimes make, thinking that we
aren’t as tough as nails when it comes down to the financial fundamentals. One thing
we’re great at is sharing financial data with everyone in the company and giving every-
33
one a stake in our success via stock options, profit sharing, and so forth. Transparency
is one of our highest values.
We all know when our bottom line is starting to suffer, which makes course
corrections a lot easier. We also rigorously analyze the work environment, looking at
individual, team and business unit performance. And we have systems in place to
make sure we’re listening to everyone’s ideas about how to improve the business.
Reporter: Do you see everyone as a potential leader?
Ohmet: That’s a tricky question. Everyone can show leadership behaviors at
times, but we view management itself as a serious discipline and profession, as we do
any other technical profession, such as engineering, toxicology, or chemistry. Our
supervisors may have technical skills but they’re also management professionals and
we treat them that way. They’re well trained and are expected to grow and to continu-
ously improve. Not everyone can be or wants to be a manager.
Reporter: You said you analyze team behavior as well. How does that work?
Ohmet: We have developed internal taxonomies that identify healthy and
unhealthy units, departments, and locations. We have linked the typologies to our
performance outcome measures. Consequently, every supervisor, manager, and
executive has a complete picture—a moving picture, if you will—of how healthy
their area is and what can be done to improve it.
These pictures are based on integrated metrics that enable us to drill up or down
in the organization, looking at how the organization behaves and helping us identify
interventions that will improve our performance.
Reporter: How do you define healthy?
Ohmet: In HIPOC, healthy means that employees feel safe physically and
emotionally, meet and exceed performance targets and work collaboratively with
internal and external customers. We also look at how strongly connected our employees
are to HIPOC on a personal level, understanding that some people need more connection
to their place of work than others.
And health means maintaining ethical operations and living by our values. For
example, with all the personal information we have on our employees, our customers
and our partners, there’s the potential for misuse of information. Ethics is a must in
this environment.
I’d say our values and ethics have remained stable over the years even as our
businesses have shifted, our technologies have become more powerful, we’ve moved into
other regions and industries, and we’ve run into new ethical questions. It’s good to have
a values bedrock on which you can make decisions. Some things shouldn’t change.
34
Conclusion
This study shows that achieving high levels of

organizational performance is a multidimensional
process.
35
It’s important for a company’s values and philosophy to align with its strategies, which
then must align with performance metrics and leadership approaches. Organizational
alignment is important but so is excellent execution. Strategies, for example, must be
well thought out, and the organization should strive to exceed customer expectations.
The study also suggests that, over the next 10 years, these characteristics of
high-performance organizations are likely to remain stable but the ways in which
companies demonstrate those characteristics will evolve. For example, there will be
changes in leadership competencies, talent-management programs, technology usage,
customer service, performance metrics, and the like. Achieving and maintaining high
performance will require companies to adapt to a changing marketplace and shifting
social attitudes.
Organizational leaders will also need to adapt to new theories and understandings
of high performance, staying abreast of the research in the field. After all, today’s favored
strategies and best practices can easily become tomorrow’s failures of imagination. Amid
these changes in practices and marketplaces, there will companies that are especially
outstanding in terms of their ability to perform at a high level for years at a time. These
organizations will always be worth studying because they have much to teach us.
36
Epilogue
This study shows that companies are high-performance organizations because of the
effectiveness and efficiency of their leadership and management of operations. As you
have read in this study, there are a number of factors that specifically influence corporate
performance—talent management, globalization, authenticity, technology, and the
like—and the importance of strategy, customer focus, processes, and values to corporate
performance. It identifies specific actions you can implement to ensure your business will
be a high-performance organization, pointing up the importance of a multidimensional
approach.
Alignment of values and mission and then alignment of these with performance
metrics and leadership approach is critical to success as an organization. Each of these
areas also has key practices that must be followed—from clear and well thought out
strategies to an organizational culture that is externally focused on customers,
markets, and competitors, to clarity about performance expectations.
Thus our study should give you the start of a to-do list to examine your
organization’s well being and start you on the way to building and sustaining a high-
growth company.
We need only to look at companies that are complacent and therefore not
performing to their potential to recognize how important it is to know what makes a
high-performance organization. Only then can we begin the building process.
AMA has made a commitment to continue to develop timely, relevant learning
opportunities that will support your effort. We recognize that creating a high-
performance organization in the twenty-first century will demand your organization
unlearn and bury some old habits of the twentieth century. We can help you do this.
Edward T. Reilly
President and Chief Executive Officer
American Management Association
37
Appendix
About This Survey
Target Survey Population

The target survey population of the AMA/Institute for Corporate Productivity High-
Performance Organization Survey consisted of the Institute for Corporate Productivity
e-mail list of primarily high-level human resource professionals; AMA’s international
e-mail list of supervisors, managers and executives across a wide range of functions;
and HR.com’s list of members. In total, 1,369 usable surveys were submitted. Most
organizations were either global (34%) or multinational (26%), while the rest were
national.
Survey Instrument
In this survey, multiple questions used the well-accepted Likert-type scale, with a
1 rating generally designated as “very strongly disagree” and a 7 rating designated as
“very strongly agree.” Market-performance questions used a 1-to-5 scale so the data
would remain comparable with previous AMA/HRI surveys. There were 23 questions
in all, 11 geared toward the demographics of respondents. Some questions had
multiple parts.
Procedure
A link to an online survey was e-mailed to the target population by region during
April and May 2007.
38
Demographic Questions and Results

Table 1
In what function do you currently work?

Finance 6.27%
General management 16.89
HR 33.93
Administrative 4.34
Marketing 6.35
Operations 7.67
Research and development 4.73
Sales 4.26
Systems/IT 3.41
Other 12.15
Table 2
What is your current title?

CEO/President/Chairman 5.73%
EVP/SVP 2.79
Vice President 7.13
Director 23.55
Manager 34.70
Supervisor 3.64
Other 22.46
Table 3
What is your level of responsibility?

Corporate 42.68%
Division 19.05
Region 13.32
Plant 6.27
Office 18.68
39
Table 4
What is your gender?

Male 53.14%
Female 46.86
Table 5
What is your age?

24 or younger 1.63%
25-30 6.66
31-35 12.16
36-40 15.26
41-45 20.91
46-50 16.65
51-55 14.95
56-60 8.83
61-65 2.56
66-plus 0.39
Table 6
What is the size of your organization’s

entire workforce in the world?
Under 100 employees 17.58%
100-499 18.05
500-999 8.06
1,000-3,499 13.17
3,500-4,999 5.27
5,000-9,999 7.98
10,000 or more 29.89
40
Table 7
What is the total revenue (in USD) of

your entire worldwide organization?
Less than $50 million 27.67%
$50-$249 million 13.95
$250-$499 million 8.45
$500-$999 million 7.91
$1 B to $2.99 B 11.40
$3 B to $9.99 B 11.94
Over $10 B 18.68
Table 8
Please identify your organization by type of operation:

Global (high level of global integration) 33.59%
Multinational (national/regional operations act independently) 26.22
National (operations in one country only) 40.19
41
Table 9
In which overall region are you located?

Canada 9.46%
U.S. 14.69
Mexico 4.53
United Kingdom 6.36
France 4.83
Germany 5.13
Other Western Europe 5.92
Eastern Europe 4.90
Scandinavia 3.32
China 5.13
India 4.22
Japan 4.17
Korea 2.79
Other Asia 5.02
Central America 3.06
South America 4.51
Caribbean 2.10
Africa 3.54
Oceania 2.40
Middle East 3.92
42
Performance Questions and Results
About These Categories

A variable labeled performance was created from the average of the four performance
questions shown below. A tertiary split was then done on performance, creating high,
middle, and low groups. The Higher Performers are the high group, and the Lower
Performers are the low group. Data from these two groups were incorporated into
many of the tables in this appendix.
In addition, Pearson correlations were calculated between the variable
performance and each of the individual practices. Relationships that are statistically
significant at the .01 level (two-tailed) are noted and the rest are marked as not
significant.
A gap analysis was also done that compared the differences in responses between
the Higher Performers and the Lower Performers. Positive values indicate that Higher
Performers engage in a specific practice more so than Lower Performers. Negative
values indicate the opposite. The greater the absolute value, the greater the differences
between Higher and Lower Performers.
Table 10
On a scale from 1-5, how would you rate the following compared to the last five years?*
High Low
Responses Overall Performers Performers
Your revenue growth 3.81 4.78 2.75
Your market share 3.66 4.50 2.75
Your profitability 3.68 4.59 2.62
Your customer satisfaction 3.69 4.30 3.07
Overall market performance 3.71 4.54 2.80
*Responses to these questions are based on a 5-point scale, with

1 = “at an all-time low level” and 5 = “at an all-time high level.”
43
Table 11
How do the following performance indicators compare to the last five years?
Revenue Market Customer

Responses Growth Share Profitability Satisfaction
At an all-time low level 2.00% 1.17% 1.83% 0.58%
Significantly worse 8.26 8.42 10.01 5.01
About the same 18.68 26.61 21.77 30.05
Significantly better 48.54 50.38 51.04 53.26
At an all-time high level 22.52 13.42 15.35 11.10
Value Proposition Questions and Results

Table 12
How does your organization create its value proposition?
Sometimes
Very Agree and Very
Strongly Strongly Somewhat Sometimes Somewhat Strongly Strongly
Responses Disagree Disagree Disagree Disagree Agree Agree Agree
Lowest prices 21.45% 25.77% 16.35% 16.23% 10.10% 6.92% 3.18%
Low prices with desirable features 14.67 22.80 14.67 17.27 15.80 11.29 3.50
Distinctive branding 1.17 2.23 3.18 9.87 19.11 41.72 22.72
Customization 2.11 3.37 4.11 11.58 18.42 34.32 26.11
44
Table 13
On a scale from 1-7, how strongly do you agree or disagree that

your organization’s value proposition is created by offering the following?
Correlation Difference
Between Between
All Higher Lower Performance HP and LP
Responses Respondents* Performers* Performers* and Practice** Scores***
Lowest price products or services 3.01 2.91 3.08 n.s. -0.17
Lower price products or services with

desirable extra features 3.45 3.37 3.51 n.s. -0.14
Distinctive branded products or services 5.60 5.81 5.32 0.16 0.49
Products or services that are customized

for specific customers 5.48 5.61 5.22 0.13 0.39
* Scores based on 7-point Likert Scale.

** Pearson correlations were calculated between the variable performance for all respondents and
each of the individual practices. Relationships that are statistically significant at the .01 level (two-tailed)
are noted and the rest are marked as not significant.
*** Differences between Higher-Performer and Lower-Performer scores.
Product Questions and Results

Table 14
Which of your customers’ needs are your products designed to meet?
Sometimes
Very Agree and Very
Immediate needs 0.82% 1.53% 3.06% 7.65% 18.47% 39.39% 29.08%
Short-term needs 1.03 2.57 3.80 9.55 23.51 37.89 21.66
Long-term needs 0.62 0.21 2.77 6.57 14.99 40.76 34.09
Future needs 0.83 1.24 4.97 10.67 18.65 33.89 29.74
45
Table 15
On a scale from 1-7, how strongly do you agree or disagree that

your organization’s products are designed to meet your customers’ following needs?
Between Between
Responses Respondents Performers Performers and Practice Scores
External customers’ immediate needs 5.76 5.92 5.52 0.13 0.40
External customers’ short-term needs 5.52 5.58 5.40 n.s. 0.18
External customers’ long-term needs 5.94 6.14 5.68 0.19 0.46
External customers’ future needs 5.66 5.93 5.36 0.19 0.57
Management Questions and Results

Table 16
Does your organization’s management expect employees to be good at the following?
Sometimes
Very Agree and Very
Efficiency 0.30% 0.71% 1.83% 4.97% 15.01% 45.03% 32.15%
Quickly adapting to make different

products or deliver different services 0.51 1.53 2.86 6.33 18.28 40.96 29.52
Understanding how to make many

different types of products or deliver
many different types of services 0.93 2.37 6.09 12.18 22.19 34.37 21.88
Using their skills, knowledge and

experience to create unique solutions
for customers 0.92 1.94 3.17 6.13 13.60 36.40 37.83
46
Table 17
On a scale from 1-7, how strongly do you agree or disagree

that your organization’s management expects employees to be good at the following?
Between Between
Efficiency 5.97 6.19 5.75 0.17 0.44
Quickly adapting to make different

products or deliver different services 5.81 6.02 5.56 0.17 0.46
Understanding how to make many

different types of products or deliver
many different types of services 5.43 5.60 5.12 0.15 0.48
Using their skills, knowledge and

experience to create unique solutions
for customers 5.90 6.27 5.47 0.27 0.80
Process Questions and Results

Table 18
Are your organization’s processes primarily designed to create the following?
Sometimes
Very Agree and Very
Efficiency 0.92% 3.47% 5.30% 11.72% 24.57% 32.62% 21.41%
Effectiveness 0.41 1.63 3.46 9.05 21.06 38.35 26.04
Flexibility 1.84 3.57 7.24 16.53 26.02 27.55 17.24
Uniqueness 1.55 4.44 9.70 16.41 24.97 25.28 17.65
47
Table 19

that your organization’s processes are primarily designed to create the following?
Between Between
Efficiency 5.39 5.73 4.92 0.26 0.81
Effectiveness 5.68 5.99 5.24 0.27 0.75
Flexibility 5.13 5.56 4.61 0.28 0.96
Uniqueness 5.05 5.38 4.68 0.20 0.71
Employee Questions and Results

Table 20
Which type of employees best fit your organization’s culture?
Sometimes
Very Agree and Very
Logical thinkers 0.41% 1.12% 3.86% 11.27% 24.47% 39.49% 19.39%
Intuitive thinkers 0.61 2.13 6.81 14.84 27.03 30.39 18.19
Steady workers 0.20 2.03 3.24 10.23 25.53 40.73 18.03
Rapid workers 0.61 1.94 6.12 17.14 28.06 31.63 14.49
48
Table 21

that the following types of employees fit your organization’s culture?
Between Between
Logical thinkers 5.54 5.80 5.29 0.18 0.50
Intuitive thinkers 5.29 5.58 5.00 0.19 0.58
Steady workers 5.53 5.67 5.43 0.09 0.24
Rapid workers 5.23 5.44 5.08 0.10 0.36
Strategy Questions and Results

Table 22
How strongly do you agree or disagree with the following statements regarding your organization’s strategy?
Sometimes
Very Agree and Very
My organization’s philosophy
statement is consistent with
its strategy. 1.20% 2.61% 4.47% 9.91% 20.92% 39.11% 21.79%
My organization’s strategic plan is

clear and well thought out. 1.95 3.79 6.93 12.13 25.79 34.02 15.38
My organization’s philosophy
statement is frequently discussed. 2.74 8.87 13.03 15.88 26.94 22.56 9.97
49
Table 22 (continued)
How strongly do you agree or disagree with the following statements regarding your organization’s strategy?
Sometimes
Very Agree and Very
The basic theme of my organization’s

philosophy statement matches my
personal philosophy. 1.41 2.50 4.23 13.36 23.13 37.02 18.35
I know what I need to know about

my organization’s strategy in order
to do my job effectively. 1.30 2.27 5.83 7.99 21.81 36.93 23.87
The behavior of my organization’s

executive management team is
consistent with the organization’s
philosophy as I understand it. 2.49 4.44 6.18 15.06 21.78 34.67 15.38

middle managers is consistent with
the organization’s philosophy. 1.63 2.51 7.95 18.30 33.33 28.87 7.41

executives is consistent with the
behaviors needed to successfully
execute the strategic plan. 2.28 4.34 5.86 15.94 23.43 36.01 12.15

middle managers is consistent with
the behaviors needed to successfully
My organization-wide performance
measures match the organization’s
strategy. 1.96 3.04 7.17 16.63 26.74 34.78 9.67

employees is consistent with the
organization’s philosophy. 0.87 3.69 6.62 20.93 34.16 26.36 7.38

50
Table 23
On a scale from 1-7, how strongly do you agree or disagree with the following statements
regarding your organization’s strategy?
Between Between
My organization’s philosophy statement

is consistent with its strategy. 5.51 5.89 5.02 0.27 0.87
My organization’s strategic plan is clear

and well thought out. 5.20 5.64 4.61 0.32 1.02
My organization’s philosophy statement

is frequently discussed. 4.63 4.93 4.22 0.21 0.70
The basic theme of my organization’s

philosophy statement matches my
personal philosophy. 5.39 5.69 5.02 0.23 0.66
I know what I need to know about my

organization’s strategy in order to do
my job effectively. 5.53 5.80 5.08 0.23 0.73

executive management team is consistent
with the organization’s philosophy as I
understand it. 5.15 5.53 4.60 0.25 0.93
The behavior of my organization’s middle

managers is consistent with the
organization’s philosophy. 4.95 5.29 4.48 0.25 0.80
51
regarding your organization’s strategy?
Between Between

executives is consistent with the
behaviors needed to successfully execute
the strategic plan. 5.11 5.50 4.61 0.25 0.89
The behavior of my organization’s middle

managers is consistent with the behaviors
needed to successfully execute the
strategic plan. 4.91 5.29 4.43 0.26 0.86
My organization-wide performance
measures match the organization’s
strategy. 5.06 5.50 4.47 0.29 1.04

organization’s philosophy. 4.92 5.28 4.43 0.27 0.85

execute the strategic plan. 4.89 5.31 4.37 0.29 0.94
52
Customer Questions and Results

Table 24
What is your organization’s strategy regarding customers?
Sometimes
Very Agree and Very
We assess and determine our

customers’ future needs. 0.34% 1.68% 4.94% 10.33% 30.30% 37.37% 15.04%
We believe that the business exists

primarily to serve customers. 0.00 0.34 3.02 6.49 14.65 39.37 36.13
We strive to be the best in the world

in providing value for our best
customers. 0.23 1.92 3.16 6.09 16.91 38.22 33.48
We exceed our customers’

expectations. 0.67 2.02 4.59 18.03 33.15 29.79 11.76
We have a process to assess and

determine our customers’ future
needs. 1.14 3.99 8.31 15.72 29.04 29.61 12.19
We accurately target our customers’

long-term needs. 1.13 3.72 6.99 15.90 35.74 26.83 9.70
We use highly developed customer-

listening strategies to determine our
customers’ expectations. 2.18 6.66 11.60 20.32 25.60 23.19 10.45
We use customer research

information to shape new products
and services. 2.31 4.75 9.26 15.63 26.85 29.28 11.92
We use customer information as the

most important factor for developing
new products and services. 1.62 2.66 6.94 16.44 28.59 30.90 12.85
My organization develops special

processes for our best customers. 1.40 3.15 8.17 13.54 29.17 29.05 15.52
Our internal processes are designed

to best meet the needs of the
customer. 1.23 3.59 8.42 20.54 28.40 27.61 10.21
My organization has flexible

procedures and policies that act as
guidelines in meeting customer needs. 2.03 4.52 8.47 19.66 29.72 24.86 10.73
53
Table 25
regarding your organization’s strategy regarding customers?
Between Between
We assess and determine our customers’

future needs. 5.41 5.73 5.02 0.26 0.71
We believe that the business exists

primarily to serve customers. 5.98 6.22 5.66 0.22 0.56
We strive to be the best in the world in

providing value for our best customers. 5.86 6.20 5.47 0.28 0.74
We exceed our customers’ expectations. 5.17 5.59 4.71 0.33 0.88
We have a process to assess and

determine our customers’ future needs. 5.05 5.43 4.60 0.25 0.84
We accurately target our customers’

long-term needs. 5.01 5.38 4.48 0.30 0.90
We use highly developed customer-

listening strategies to determine our
customers’ expectations. 4.72 5.12 4.24 0.26 0.88
We use customer research information

to shape new products and services. 4.95 5.28 4.49 0.24 0.79
We use customer information as the

most important factor for developing
new products and services. 5.12 5.53 4.58 0.30 0.95
My organization develops special

processes for our best customers. 5.15 5.48 4.88 0.17 0.60
Our internal processes are designed to

best meet the needs of the customer. 4.95 5.33 4.51 0.28 0.82
My organization has flexible procedures

and policies that act as guidelines in
meeting customer needs. 4.88 5.24 4.52 0.22 0.72
54
Leadership Questions and Results

Table 26
How strongly do you agree or disagree with the following statements regarding your organization’s leadership?
Sometimes
Very Agree and Very
My immediate supervisor understands

the strengths I bring to my job. 1.29% 2.22% 5.37% 9.11% 20.44% 39.02% 22.55%
My immediate supervisor routinely

helps me improve my performance. 3.64 4.47 10.93 16.22 27.03 26.67 11.05
Employees in my organization feel

comfortable disagreeing with anyone
in the organization. 4.35 7.44 12.59 21.97 28.26 19.68 5.72
Our HR function is continually

creating innovative approaches to
increase employee effectiveness. 6.94 10.40 13.87 21.04 26.01 15.72 6.01
Our HR function is continually

borrowing innovative approaches to
increase employee effectiveness. 6.99 10.84 14.34 21.21 26.69 14.80 5.13
In my organization, management
promotes the person who has the
best skills and knowledge to do
the job. 4.73 5.08 9.58 19.28 26.91 25.06 9.35
Management rewards employees

who take risks to better serve
customers. 4.31 6.76 11.42 22.61 26.81 20.51 7.58
Employees are rewarded for meeting

customer satisfaction goals. 2.79 5.24 7.92 20.26 28.29 26.54 8.96
In my organization, everyone is
clear about the organization’s
performance expectations. 2.85 3.88 7.19 18.49 25.46 30.25 11.87
Employees are empowered to use

their own judgment to meet
customer needs. 3.78 4.47 7.91 20.18 31.19 24.54 7.91
Employees believe that their

behavior affects the organization. 1.60 3.21 6.30 15.92 27.15 31.16 14.66
55
Table 27
regarding your organization’s leadership?
Between Between
My immediate supervisor understands the

strengths I bring to my job. 5.52 5.77 5.23 0.18 0.54
My immediate supervisor routinely helps

me improve my performance. 4.83 5.06 4.54 0.16 0.52
Employees in my organization feel

comfortable disagreeing with anyone in
the organization. 4.44 4.66 4.07 0.17 0.59
Our HR function is continually creating

innovative approaches to increase
employee effectiveness. 4.20 4.40 3.83 0.18 0.57
Our HR function is continually borrowing

innovative approaches to increase
employee effectiveness. 4.15 4.33 3.78 0.17 0.55
In my organization, management
promotes the person who has the best
skills and knowledge to do the job. 4.71 5.04 4.19 0.25 0.85
Management rewards employees who

take risks to better serve customers. 4.53 4.80 4.11 0.19 0.69
Employees are rewarded for meeting

customer satisfaction goals. 4.81 5.09 4.42 0.21 0.67
In my organization, everyone is clear

about the organization’s
performance expectations. 4.98 5.43 4.51 0.26 0.92
Employees are empowered to use their

own judgment to meet customer needs. 4.76 5.09 4.41 0.20 0.68
Employees believe that their behavior

affects the organization. 5.16 5.50 4.73 0.24 0.77
56
Performance Questions and Results

Table 28
How strongly do you agree or disagree with the following statements regarding your organization’s performance?
Sometimes
Very Agree and Very
My organization’s performance
measures are clearly defined. 1.81% 3.37% 7.82% 14.56% 26.47% 32.37% 13.60%
Employees receive the training and

instruction necessary to do the
job properly. 2.16 4.57 6.97 17.67 28.73 31.49 8.41
My supervisor has the information

and knowledge I need to do my job. 2.73 4.34 5.83 15.38 25.31 34.12 12.28
I receive the information I need to

do my job from my supervisor. 3.47 4.70 9.03 18.44 26.36 27.97 10.02
I receive the information I need to do

my job from my external customers. 3.36 3.49 7.88 20.54 30.62 27.00 7.11
In my organization, employees have

easy access to any information within
the organization that they need to
improve doing their job. 2.17 4.95 8.20 21.71 27.99 25.69 9.29
When employees change jobs within

the organization, they know what
they must do to perform well in the
new job. 2.11 5.09 7.69 22.46 32.75 23.33 6.58
My peers and others within my

organization have the information
and knowledge I need to do my job. 2.32 3.54 6.47 22.59 32.23 27.23 5.62
In my job, functional area, or team,

we are always aware of how satisfied
our internal customers are. 0.99 4.21 7.67 23.76 30.07 25.25 8.04
In my organization, we are always

aware of how satisfied our external
customers are. 1.00 3.36 7.72 22.29 28.64 27.77 9.22
My organization has a clearly

defined and well-followed process to
resolve disagreements. 3.90 7.56 15.73 23.54 24.63 19.63 5.00
57
How strongly do you agree or disagree with the following statements regarding your organization’s performance?
Sometimes
Very Agree and Very
Our delivery schedules for products

and services are based on customer
needs. 1.38 2.25 5.50 13.63 21.63 37.38 18.25
Our internal processes are designed

to enable us to work together as well
as possible. 2.90 4.83 9.30 20.53 27.54 26.57 8.33
Our highest priorities are on meeting

customers’ needs. 0.48 1.81 3.02 12.91 18.46 36.55 26.78
We act as if customer service is only

a required function rather than a
critically important function. 16.38 18.61 15.63 16.38 17.12 11.54 4.34
We use leading-edge information

solution technology for customer
relationship management. 7.16 10.93 14.57 20.35 21.98 17.96 7.04
We seldom change our processes. 10.53 17.07 19.98 23.12 16.46 9.32 3.51
We keep current with state-of-the-

market technological advances. 5.26 7.46 10.76 22.86 25.06 18.95 9.66
Our performance measures are

internally focused. 3.81 6.89 13.78 28.04 28.41 15.25 3.81
Our performance measures focus on

customer retention. 2.53 5.06 11.38 23.26 26.93 23.64 7.21
We use numerous direct measures for

quality control of our products and
services, such as cost of replacement,
warranty or replacement service. 3.39 7.05 10.44 22.71 23.13 24.26 9.03
We use numerous indirect measures

for quality control of our products and
services, such as lost business or
internal rework. 5.19 5.85 9.04 25.80 26.46 19.81 7.85
Salespeople and frontline employees

have little access to competitor
information. 13.11 17.21 17.90 20.90 17.35 10.11 3.42
Employees from different internal

functions make sales calls together. 7.59 12.41 12.70 25.55 22.19 14.16 5.40
58
Table 29
regarding your organization’s performance?
Between Between
My organization’s performance measures

are clearly defined. 5.12 5.53 4.70 0.25 0.83
Employees receive the training and

instruction necessary to do the job properly. 4.94 5.27 4.50 0.24 0.77
My supervisor has the information and

knowledge I need to do my job. 5.08 5.37 4.76 0.19 0.61
I receive the information I need to do my

job from my supervisor. 4.84 5.01 4.56 0.16 0.45
I receive the information I need to do my

job from my external customers. 4.81 4.99 4.59 0.14 0.41
In my organization, employees have easy

access to any information within the
organization that they need to improve
doing their job. 4.83 5.09 4.52 0.18 0.56
When employees change jobs within the

organization, they know what they must
do to perform well in the new job. 4.75 5.00 4.44 0.20 0.56
My peers and others within my

organization have the information and
knowledge I need to do my job. 4.83 5.05 4.59 0.17 0.46
In my job, functional area, or team, we

are always aware of how satisfied our
internal customers are. 4.86 5.05 4.59 0.15 0.46
In my organization, we are always

aware of how satisfied our external
customers are. 4.94 5.23 4.68 0.18 0.55
My organization has a clearly defined

and well-followed process to resolve
disagreements. 4.36 4.48 4.12 0.12 0.35
Our delivery schedules for products

and services are based on customer needs. 5.37 5.60 5.11 0.16 0.49
59
regarding your organization’s performance?
Between Between
Our internal processes are designed to

enable us to work together as well
as possible. 4.78 5.11 4.37 0.24 0.74
Our highest priorities are on meeting

customers’ needs. 5.64 5.89 5.32 0.20 0.57
We act as if customer service is only a

required function rather than a critically
important function. 3.51 3.25 3.68 n.s. -0.43
We use leading-edge information solution

technology for customer relationship
management. 4.21 4.55 3.84 0.17 0.71
We seldom change our processes. 3.60 3.47 3.86 n.s. -0.38
We keep current with state-of-the-market

technological advances. 4.50 4.85 4.08 0.18 0.77
Our performance measures are internally

focused. 4.31 4.26 4.30 n.s. -0.04
Our performance measures focus on

customer retention. 4.67 4.94 4.38 0.19 0.56
We use numerous direct measures for

services, such as cost of replacement,
warranty or replacement service. 4.64 4.82 4.29 0.14 0.53
We use numerous indirect measures for

services, such as lost business or
internal rework. 4.53 4.71 4.27 0.13 0.43
Salespeople and frontline employees have

little access to competitor information. 3.56 3.54 3.67 n.s. -0.12
Employees from different internal

functions make sales calls together. 4.06 4.21 3.88 n.s. 0.34
60
Culture Questions and Results

Table 30
How strongly do you agree or disagree with the following statements regarding your organization’s culture?
Sometimes
Very Agree and Very
A shared value that keeps my

organization together is loyalty to
the organization. 1.63% 2.89% 6.90% 14.68% 26.60% 34.63% 12.67%
A shared value that keeps my

organization together is commitment
to innovation. 3.02 5.42 10.96 20.40 28.46 24.18 7.56
Our organizational culture is internally

competitive. 2.65 6.05 14.25 20.81 30.01 20.93 5.30
In my organization, everyone working

together cohesively is the most
important value. 3.37 5.37 12.23 20.10 24.59 26.97 7.37
My organization emphasizes
readiness to meet new challenges. 1.13 2.88 6.75 17.25 26.88 34.88 10.25
My organization’s organizational
culture is externally focused on our
customers, markets, and competitors. 1.51 2.52 6.17 14.74 27.71 34.38 12.97
The information and knowledge I

need to do my job is spelled out in
well-established procedures,
practices, and instructions that are
changed as necessary by my supervisor. 6.92 12.44 13.72 24.36 23.72 14.74 4.10
The information and knowledge I

need to do my job is spelled out in
well-established procedures,
practices, and instructions that are
changed as necessary by me. 5.31 7.59 10.37 23.14 26.42 20.61 6.57
If employees in my organization know

they can improve work processes,
they will make the changes. 1.88 2.38 9.77 22.56 31.70 25.56 6.14
61
How strongly do you agree or disagree with the following statements regarding your organization’s culture?
Sometimes
Very Agree and Very
My organization’s grapevine is as
accurate as, or more accurate than,
most formal communications. 3.75 6.86 12.55 28.72 27.04 16.30 4.79
My organization’s grapevine is always

faster than my organization’s formal
communications. 1.80 4.77 8.12 25.26 31.31 19.97 8.76
During work breaks, employees most

often talk about organization-related
issues. 3.53 7.32 12.68 30.85 27.58 14.12 3.92
Most employees can find

knowledgeable, informed opinions
from co-workers about issues
affecting the organization. 1.02 2.68 6.50 27.01 36.43 21.78 4.59
In my organization, employees need

to bypass the formal organization
to get things done. 9.39 17.77 21.83 24.75 16.12 7.49 2.66
Most employees would say that my

organization is very safety-conscious. 0.80 3.05 5.31 17.37 26.79 29.71 16.98

organization is very concerned about
employees. 2.90 3.78 6.43 17.28 25.98 31.90 11.73
In my organization, most employees

participate in or show interest in the
organization-sponsored social events. 2.46 3.75 7.50 20.57 30.01 27.30 8.41
Most employees think this is a good

place to work. 2.01 1.88 2.76 13.17 28.73 36.14 15.31
62
Table 31
regarding your organization’s culture?
Between Between
A shared value that keeps my organization

together is loyalty to the organization. 5.16 5.50 4.85 0.21 0.65
A shared value that keeps my organization

together is commitment to innovation. 4.69 5.04 4.18 0.28 0.86
Our organizational culture is internally

competitive. 4.53 4.68 4.43 n.s. 0.25
In my organization, everyone working

together cohesively is the most
important value. 4.68 4.91 4.30 0.18 0.60
My organization emphasizes readiness

to meet new challenges. 5.12 5.53 4.65 0.28 0.87
My organization’s organizational culture

is externally focused on our customers,
markets, and competitors. 5.20 5.55 4.84 0.23 0.71
The information and knowledge I need to

do my job is spelled out in well-established
procedures, practices, and instructions that
are changed as necessary by my supervisor. 4.06 4.13 3.81 0.10 0.33
The information and knowledge I need to

do my job is spelled out in well-established
procedures, practices, and instructions
that are changed as necessary by me. 4.46 4.66 4.27 0.11 0.39
If employees in my organization know

they can improve work processes, they
will make the changes. 4.81 5.06 4.50 0.19 0.56
63
regarding your organization’s culture?
Between Between
My organization’s grapevine is as
accurate as, or more accurate than,
most formal communications. 4.36 4.43 4.28 n.s. 0.15
My organization’s grapevine is always

faster than my organization’s formal
communications. 4.74 4.70 4.77 n.s. -0.07
During work breaks, employees most

often talk about organization-related
issues. 4.30 4.34 4.23 n.s. 0.10
Most employees can find knowledgeable,

informed opinions from co-workers about
issues affecting the organization. 4.79 4.94 4.61 0.12 0.33
In my organization, employees need to

bypass the formal organization to get
things done. 3.54 3.39 3.81 -0.12 -0.42

organization is very safety-conscious. 5.23 5.29 5.02 n.s. 0.27

organization is very concerned about
employees. 5.02 5.26 4.57 0.24 0.69
In my organization, most employees

participate in or show interest in the
organization-sponsored social events. 4.87 5.12 4.57 0.18 0.55
Most employees think this is a good

place to work. 5.34 5.65 4.87 0.28 0.78
64
Ethics Questions and Results

Table 32
How strongly do you agree or disagree with the following statements regarding ethics within your organization?
Sometimes
Very Agree and Very
We adhere to the highest standard

of ethical behavior throughout the
organization. 1.00% 1.25% 3.13% 9.02% 16.17% 37.84% 31.58%
In my organization, no one would

consider misrepresenting a situation
for personal gain. 2.03 2.28 7.72 14.81 20.63 31.77 20.76
Table 33
regarding ethics within your organization?
Between Between
We adhere to the highest standard of

ethical behavior throughout the
organization. 5.78 5.99 5.45 0.23 0.55
In my organization, no one would

consider misrepresenting a situation
for personal gain. 5.28 5.39 4.98 0.16 0.42
65
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Authors and Contributors
PROJECT LEADER
Jay J. Jamrog is the senior vice president of research at the Institute for Corporate
Productivity, formerly the Human Resource Institute (HRI). As a futurist, he has
devoted the past 20 years to identifying and analyzing the major issues and trends
affecting the management of people in organizations. Jamrog is the associate articles
editor for the “building a strategic HR function” key knowledge area of Human
Resource Planning, has had articles published in major business magazines, and is
frequently quoted in business publications and newspapers. He often collaborates
with, and speaks before, other organizations and associations on major research topics
related to the future of people management. Prior to joining HRI in 1982, he held
numerous management positions, including vice president of purchasing for a large
import/export wholesaler. Contact information: (727) 345-2226 or jamrog@i4cp.com.
AUTHORS
Dr. Miles H. Overholt, Ph.D., is the director of systems measurement for the Institute
for Corporate Productivity. Overholt leads an international team in developing new
organizational assessment tools to measure the linkage among strategy, behavior,
personality type, and individual competencies. As the team leader, he helped create
the Organizational Capabilities Index (MAP—Measuring the Alignment of People—
in Europe), the comparative organization tool that underlies the Institute for Corporate
Productivity’s study of strategic alignment employee behavior and organizational
performance. He has over 25 years of consulting and research expertise in organizational
design, change, and behavior. He is the author of Building Flexible Organizations: A
People-Centered Approach and has written numerous articles on organizational perform-
ance, change processes, systems thinking, and systems metrics. His undergraduate degree
is from Lafayette College, and he earned his doctorate at the University of Pennsylvania.
Contact information: (856) 786-9355 or RMCGMHO@aol.com.
69
Donna J. Dennis, Ph.D., is a leadership development professional with over 30 years

of experience, helping leaders and teams increase leadership and team effectiveness
through coaching, strategic planning, and team-building. She is known for innovative,
business-focused solutions to organization and leadership issues. She holds a master’s
degree in education, a Ph.D. in human development, and certification in personality
assessment and executive coaching. Contact information: (609) 497-1997 or
donna@leadership-solutions.info.
James M. Lee, Ph.D., is an assistant professor of marketing at the University of Tampa.

His research focus is in consumer psychology with an emphasis on personality
influences on decision making. Recent research publications include the use of
personality in personnel decisions and impact on employee burnout. Most recently
he headed the marketing and IT departments of a multinational retailer, and he was
president of the wholly owned e-commerce subsidiary. Contact information: (813)
253-6221 or jlee@ut.edu.
Carol L. Morrison is the Productivity and Corporate Performance Knowledge Center

manager for the the Institute for Corporate Productivity. She has a BS degree in
sociology/social work and a BS degree in business administration/marketing. Her career
experience spans public, private, and nonprofit sectors. She has established and directed a
municipal government information department and headed employee communications
for national and multinational corporations. A senior research analyst, she is the author
of research reports on subjects ranging from change management to employee
engagement. Contact information: (727) 345-2226 or writerclm@tampabay.rr.com.
Mark Vickers is the vice president of research at the Institute for Corporate
Productivity, formerly HRI. He has authored many reports and white papers for
the institute, is the institute’s former managing editor, and is currently the editor of
TrendWatcher and The Fortnight Report. He has authored and coauthored various
periodical articles and has served as an editor and project manager for a number of
AMA/HRI research projects. Contact information: (727) 345-2226 or vickers@i4cp.com.
OTHER CONTRIBUTORS
Various staff members of the Institute for Corporate Productivity provided
background research, writing, and other support for this report. Special thanks to
David Wentworth, who worked on the table data, and to Susan Fernandez, who
proofed the report.
70
About American Management Association
American Management Association (AMA) is a world leader in professional

development and performance-based learning solutions.
AMA provides individuals and organizations worldwide with the knowledge,
skills and tools to achieve performance excellence, adapt to changing realities and
prosper in a complex and competitive world. Each year thousands of customers learn
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AMA has earned the reputation as a trusted partner in worldwide professional
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and long-term results for individuals and organizations. For more information on how
you and your organization can gain a competitive advantage, visit www.amanet.org
Institute for Corporate Productivity

(Formerly known as the Human Resource Institute)
The Institute for Corporate Productivity improves corporate productivity through

a combination of research, community, tools, and technology focused on the manage-
ment of human capital. With more than 100 leading organizations as members,
including many of the best-known companies in the world, the Institute for Corporate
Productivity draws upon one of the industry’s largest and most-experienced research
teams and Executives-in-Residence to produce more than 10,000 pages annually of
rapid, reliable and respected research and analysis surrounding all facets of the
management of people in organizations. Additionally, the Institute for Corporate
Productivity identifies and analyzes the upcoming major issues and future trends
that are expected to influence workforce productivity and provides member clients
with tools and technology to execute leading-edge strategies and “next” practices on
these issues and trends.
71
About This Report
This report is based on a global survey that included 1,369
respondents, in-depth discussions among a team of researchers,
and an extensive review of the business literature. Commissioned
by American Management Association and conducted by the
Institute for Corporate Productivity (formerly the Human
Resource Institute), this report:
• Takes a historical look at the literature on high-performance
organizations
• Discusses the factors influencing organizational performance
• Describes the characteristics of high-performance
organizations in the context of data from the global survey
• Describes what the best-in-class practices may look like in
the year 2017
• Provides a detailed look at the results from the AMA/Institute
for Corporate Productivity High-Performance Organization
Survey 2007
For more information about American Management Association

www.amanet.org • 1-800-262-9699
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A m e r i c a n M a n a g e m e n t A s s o c i a t i o n

Copyright 2007, American Management Association

A Brief History of High-Performance Theory . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

External Factors Influencing Organizational Performance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

Strategy Questions and Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49

About AMA and the Institute for Corporate Productivity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 71

Although the concept and measurement of

Scientific Management and Other Theories

In contrast, Fayol touted the importance of managerial ability—as opposed

• Physical qualities such as health and vigor;

Fayol also developed “principles of management,” which he felt should be

Education and Training Focus on Performance

Management Theory Enters the Modern Age

More high-performance studies are likely to emerge in the future,

Comparing and Measuring Performance

This section highlights the primary factors that

Talents and Skills of the Workforce

…agility and resilience are likely to be characteristics of organizations

Faster and More Disruptive Change

The keys to managing threats and opportunities are the ability to

Political and Regulatory Changes

The Influence of Ethics

If organizations are going to get the discretionary behaviors from

professionals in 1985, 1993, and 2001—concluded that an ethical atmosphere in an

This section presents the characteristics of

A Model of High-Performance Organizations

High-performance organizations have processes that reinforce strategy, setting up

Processes & Values &

From Overholt, Granell, Vicere, Jargon 2006

High Performance in Practice: What the Survey Data Tell Us

Strategic Approaches: Consistent, Clear and Well Thought Out

Executives in high-performance organizations

Customer Approaches: Going Above and Beyond

Specifically, the results indicate that high-

Leadership Approaches: Focused on Performance, Beliefs, and Talent

must operate in a kind of mutual harmony to be effective. However, in today’s superstar-

of what other companies are doing to more effectively manage people.

Processes and Structure: Centered Around Metrics, Customers, and Training

High-performance organizations’ supervisors share information freely. In addition,

Values and Beliefs: Upbeat, Ethical, and Ready for Challenges

employees: High-performance organizations create an environment that fosters cohe-

The Context for High-Performance Organizations

In this section, we describe a fictional corporation

Interview with Sara Ohmet, CEO of HIPOC

Proactive, Analytical, and Values-Driven

Clear, Consistent, and Customer-Focused

Well Led and Resilient

Involved with the Community

High Tech and High Touch

plenty of opportunities to work together. We have lots of satellite offices, volunteer

Transparent, Healthy, and Professionally Managed

This study shows that achieving high levels of

About This Survey

Target Survey Population

Demographic Questions and Results

In what function do you currently work?

What is your current title?

What is your level of responsibility?

What is your gender?

What is your age?

What is the size of your organization’s

What is the total revenue (in USD) of

Please identify your organization by type of operation:

In which overall region are you located?