In the same way no one would accept medical treatment from a doctor that has never diagnosed their symptoms, no one should accept generic solutions from consultants. To us, that means we must know your organization’s purpose, markets, products and services, organizational structure, history, reporting structures and relationships, and even the politics of the organization.

Furthermore, we need to know your challenges, both internal and external, and then articulate a set of desired outcomes for any role that we might play in helping meet those challenges.

Most consulting firms focus on fixing broken organizations. Because they do, they have a vested interest in telling you how “sick” you are. The truth is that profitable companies do most things right, not wrong. We are interested in defining, identifying and developing superior performance with you, not engaging in the self-fulfilling prophecy that we “fixed” you.

We ask for two things from your organization’s leadership. Upfront, we ask you to commit to support our efforts without reservation. Productive change will not — and cannot – occur until the leadership cadre is committed to taking actions that will ensure the changes are fully implemented and supported. Second, we ask them to lead by example by focusing on superior leadership performance before focusing on the rest of the organization’s capabilities.

As we work in your organization, our objective is twofold. First, we focus on the reasons for the engagement. Second, we want to build an internal capability that is sustainable far beyond the day of our last training session or onsite visit.

We believe in hard work. Not just labor, but fruitful, productive work. Productive work is a key to self-worth, responsibility, and accountability. There are few examples of people who built something enduring who did not work hard to achieve their success. The conventional wisdom says “work smarter, not harder.” We believe in doing both.

We believe there is great worth in every human being. Every job, every task, and every interaction should respect the individual’s worth and dignity, regardless of the circumstances. All higher forms of human behavior are rooted in the recognition of and respect for individual dignity and worth.

We believe successful people and organizations have passion for what they do. They create a sense of excitement about belonging and participating in their endeavors because they care deeply about those things that have lasting meaning. For too long, managers and leaders have been taught to be “dispassionate professionals.” This separation of our humanity from our work has caused great harm to organizations. To bring out the best in people, leaders must bring out people’s passions and leverage them for the greater good.