What Does Victory Look Like?
Our management recently asked us what we think victory looks like for our teams as well as for our department as a whole. The request was to support a wider briefing to upper management on last year’s performance as well as planning for the coming year, including addressing upcoming challenges. Instead of focusing on specific deliverables and project milestones, I decided to respond in broader generic terms of how I define ‘victory’, since I believe the details like meeting or exceeding milestones are a natural result of accomplishing the vision of what victory looks like.
Each of the supervisors in our department shared their ‘defining victory’ responses with the others and the department manager, since that fosters collaboration and helps spark additional insights that we otherwise might not have considered. Based on the positive feedback I received from my colleagues, I figured it might be useful to share some of my thoughts with a broader audience, since I think these can apply to just about any team in a business environment.
Defining Victory: My Team
- We consistently meet or exceed our schedule (and budget), demonstrating technical excellence and delivering high quality products while living the company’s core values; we adapt quickly and effectively to address challenges and changing conditions
- Team members feel pride in accomplishment and fulfillment in their work / career; we work hard, but have fun doing it
- Our customers have deep trust in our ability
- Our work pipeline remains full
- Team members have mutual respect and trust, while also holding each other accountable
- All team members consistently demonstrate proactive initiative and extreme ownership (employee pull, vs. supervisor push)
- Our products meet or exceed expectations throughout manufacturing, test, and deployment
Defining Victory: Overall Department
- Cross-functional collaboration
- Working towards a common purpose as a single team
Obviously there is more to defining victory than this handful of thoughts, but I believe these points are critical to long-term success.
How do you define victory? What does success look like for your team? Visualizing it, putting it into words, writing it down, and sharing it help develop alignment throughout the organization, as well as improve the odds for achieving victory.
Disclaimer: These opinions are my own and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of my employer.