Page 11 - Finanancial Management_2022

6 ways to ensure

your team achieves

corporate goals

Avoid inefficiency by communicating how employees’
individual actions link to overarching company strategy.

By Andrew Kenney

hen she was the director depends on the actions of executives, Over several months, she visited all the
of operations for a retail managers, and employees, the report company’s stores. “I realised they do want
cosmetics chain in concluded (see the sidebar, “How to to work, they do want to deliver,” she said.
Nigeria, Tundun Address Goal-Cascading Pitfalls”). The problem was that many frontline
W Aderibigbe, FCMA, “It’s one thing to come up with a managers didn’t understand how they
CGMA, was given a straightforward strategic plan. A lot of companies go fitted into the company’s overall
mission: increase sales. She researched the through that process,” said Atif Ansari, CPA strategies.
company’s sales, assembled detailed (Canada), ACMA, CGMA, who runs Ansid, a “I got to experience a day in every one
presentations, and shared her insights in fractional CFO consulting business in of their lives. I then found I began to
meetings with the managers of the Canada. understand their language a little bit
Lagos-based company’s 26 stores. “Where it differentiates a company,” he more,” she said. “I wanted to succeed at
But to her surprise, her message didn’t continued, “is how the management team helping them, and they wanted to learn.”
seem to work. “You could tell they were executes that vision: How do you then take As she visited, she explained why it
bored,” she recalled. “They weren’t that strategy, turn it into actionable was important for managers to think
unpleasant. They weren’t trying to not do initiatives, and then cascade that through more deeply about their sales strategies
their jobs. They just didn’t understand the organisation to make sure the strategy and participate in the performance-
what these charts meant.” gets executed?” management process.
It’s an example of a common problem Here’s how Aderibigbe, Ansari, and “You have to sell it: ‘This is how I put
that was highlighted in the recent report other financial leaders have learned to set on the lights. This is how I make sure that
Reimagining Performance Management clear plans and translate company the store is pretty. This is how I make sure
from AICPA & CIMA and the World objectives for their teams. that you’re ready to serve the clients,’”
Business Council for Sustainable Aderibigbe said.
Development. Turning a top-down message into Soon enough, managers began calling
One section of the report focuses on the frontline strategy her for help and advice. An intimidating
practice of “cascading” goals, in which After her initial messages failed to corporate goal — “increase sales” — had
leaders like Aderibigbe, who now has resonate, Aderibigbe tried a new approach become a tangible set of tactics and
separate CFO and audit and advisory roles, to cascade the company’s sales goals. strategies for individual employees.
are tasked with translating overarching Instead of delivering messages directly “When you help people discover
corporate goals into objectives for from the top, she decided to work in the strengths they didn’t have, they trust you
individual team members. opposite direction. more. They listen to you more. They seek IMAGE BY SKOPEIN/IKON IMAGES
Cascading can be a powerful strategy to “The first goal was selling more. And you out more,” Aderibigbe explained. “As
ensure that individual employees are then, the second goal was for them to a leader, everything has to be about
supporting the company’s mission — but understand what strategies work,” she helping people to be more [of] what they
it’s also a highly “fallible” process that said. want to be.”
FM-MAGAZINE.COM February 2022 I FM MAGAZINE I 9