Organizations want to make an impact over a period of time. It is achieved by implementing different models. Experimenting with different parts of the entire change-making process: from ideation, recruitment, training, execution to feedback.
They’re not wrong when they try to do that. In a world full of uncertainty, there is no sure-shot way to get it right every time.
But, there is hope.
A few months back, I traveled via a luxurious bus that had a track record of being on time. Given the culture of being late by several minutes to hours in this service industry, it is an achievement.
One significant change this service provider had made was regarding their luggage storage facility. Generally, such bus has a huge side cargo compartment that stores passenger luggage. Every time a passenger carries heavy luggage, his luggage needs to be stored by opening the mammoth cargo compartment. And, that’s a huge waste of time. The most amount of time is consumed during luggage management exercise during picking up passengers from different locations in the city. Once, all passengers picked up from different spots, the bus hits the highway for the ultimate location. The same deboarding exercise follows upon arrival.
Anyone can point out that the luggage storage is the main culprit.
The bus manufacturer had modified sleeping beds with a height of one foot blank space beneath them for luggage storage. As a result, most of the passengers didn’t require to request the helper staff to open the cargo storage of the bus. They could carry the bags and could directly walk into the bus, arrange their own luggage, and bingo!
I call these kind of solutions ‘one-foot leverage’ points.
These leverage points increase the desired outcome or decrease the undesired outcome with just a little fine-tuning.
We’re not talking about something for nothing. We are talking about focusing on the areas that aren’t shining as well as they could. A little dusting here and there and that’s it!
While formulating the next product or service expansion strategy, or marketing strategy, or just increasing the impact of the project for the next 3 years, the question that we should be asking is: what are our one-foot leverage points?