This is the last of the 19 reasons why you should implement a mutual benefit philosophy within your organization.  It’s also one of the most important, because it involves continuous improvement.  If your business isn’t continually improving, then it’s degenerating.  In order to achieve actual continuous improvement, there’s one variable that all the business process improvement philosophies overlook (i.e. TCO or Six Sigma), it’s the need for a philosophy of mutual benefit.  Otherwise, information is in silos and people don’t want to share or help since they believe that they’re  in control of their own destiny and what others do isn’t as important!

As we discussed in previous posts, most process improvement projects don’t take into consideration, how and if everyone will benefit from improving the process.  Many times a process improvement to one department is a problem to another.  Let me explain…if you improve your accounts payable process with technology, then you may be costing another department to lose half of its valued employees.  This causes the manager to lose power, and therefore, they will try to hinder the success of the new technology.

By utilizing a mutual benefit philosophy, you would have identified these potential issues, and found new opportunities for the employees worth keeping and develop a compensation package for those you have to let go after the project is completed.  You would be completely honest with your employees and reward them for helping with the transition.  You would even help them find another job elsewhere.

When your company is fully engaged in a mutual benefit philosophy, your employees (management and staff) will look at their financial situation and that of their coworkers, and they themselves will develop a solution for the needed right-sizing (if applicable).  Your senior people may elect to retire so the employees with families can advance and keep their jobs.  The senior people that leave may work as consultants for the company through a transition.  The company may look to put entrepreneurial employees in their own start up businesses that they fund and own a piece of.