Think of your company processes and systems as its operating system, the equivalent of your human Windows 7, or 8, or iOS. As in your computer, you may start to notice slow performance, tiredness, sudden crashes and ‘applications’ that don’t open well. The thing still works, but it is not anymore that slick machine you bought two years ago. It may need upgrading, at least.
The company operating system is the same. It may need an upgrade. For example, a fresh look at the number of people involved in decision making, an urgent review of the internal ‘tempo’ in which everything gets paralysed for a week a month for a full Mother of All Reviews, the ‘initiatives’ that are sucking energy and time (like in your computer, you may have processes sucking all your RAM and slowing down all the ‘applications’), the things that don’t go so well and get you irritated everyday – and that irritation is growing.
In this case you need a good scanning system, a good diagnostic kit. In our Reboot Accelerator [1], we list the ‘elephants in the room’ and ‘the sacred cows’, for example, plus other 10 check-up points. We bring them to then table, impossible to escape, and then we create a Game Plan, an ‘upgrade’.
It is not a question of throwing out the baby with the bath water. Not an all-upside-down solution (like buying a new computer) but a careful upgrade.
Following this IT analogy, I would say, schedule maintenance, don’t wait for the crash. Look at what is working and not and schedule a good clean up and health check on a regular basis, even if there is no crisis. Much better when there is no crisis. ‘Close for maintenance’ for few hours, every six months at least, test the system and clean up. Keep the operating system healthy.