Your company’s success begins with the words you choose to reflect your values.
A story ran in the Wall Street Journal on October 20 about a Swiss private-equity firm that banned the word ‘deal.’ The article says that David Layton, the CEO of Partners Holding AG, held an all-employee town hall meeting in June and announced that partners caught using the D-word would be “fined” for each violation in the form of a $1,000 donation to the firm’s charitable arm.
It didn’t take long for the rest of the team to realize that it wasn’t a game. During the partners’ annual retreat, one speaker said “deal” three times in his opening presentation. He was fined $3,000 Swiss francs.
Layton knew the new policy would elicit eye rolls from many employees, so he made the ban voluntary—it would be up to the person who made the transgression to donate to charity. But Layton did have a serious intent in calling for the ban.
“How we communicate is how we behave,” Layton posted to the company’s internal message board alongside photos from the partners meeting. By showing pictures from the meeting where the firm’s most senior leaders paid the fine for using the D-word, it proved that Layton and the others were walking the talk, literally.
According to the story, “Layton says the word ‘deal’ reduces the ownership of a company—which has executives, employees, a strategy and a mission—to a one-time event. He wants the employees of his firm to act like they are owners of businesses, not merely the doers of deals.”
Since the announcement, people at the firm have started replacing ‘deal’ with ‘stewardship’ or ‘investment.’ While it’s too early to tell if Layton’s strategy will make an impact at his firm we do know that, for many organizations seeking a culture shift, words do, indeed, matter.
While I was preparing to deliver a keynote to a conference in Dubai hosted by one of the world’s most prestigious consulting companies, one of the top partners at the organization gave me a primer on organization’s use of language. I realized that they were serious about the words they chose because those words influenced behavior.
“We are a professional firm, not a commercial business,” the partner said. Although the popular media refers to the company and its peers as a consulting ‘business,’ the organization has found that when team members act like they are part of a profession and not simply a transactional business, it enhances their relationships with clients. It also leads to changes in other words—and behaviors.
For example, I learned that the firm’s consultants don’t make pitches; they submit proposals. They don’t take jobs, they undertake engagements. They don’t work for their clients, they work with their clients. Making a pitch to win a job fails to convey the depth of the long-term relationship the firm’s consultants are attempting to make with their clients.
At this consulting firm, words mattered. And they mattered so much, even outside speakers like me were required to learn the lingo—and I was glad to do it.
When I was writing a book about the Apple Store, I discovered an extraordinary example of the power of word choice. During the development of Apple’s first retail locations, Steve Jobs took a hands-on role to make sure the store wasn’t just another computer retailer.
“We’re not in the business of selling computers,” Jobs told his staff. “We’re in the business of enriching people’s lives.”
A store that enriched lives looked very different than a store that just “moved boxes” or “sold stuff,” Jobs explained. For example, a store that enriched lives would have to leave customers with a memorable experience—that’s why the Apple Store avoided commission-based salespeople. The experience was all that mattered, whether or not the customer made a purchase that day. Enriching lives meant that customers could touch and play with the devices, and they could have access to in-store classes to learn how to use the systems.
All of these features in the original Apple Stores were very different than traditional computer retailers at the time—and it began with finding the right words to convey the company’s vision.
“Enriching lives” did not start organically. It started at the top—with Steve Jobs. Only after hearing it repeatedly and knowing that Jobs was serious did everyone else get the message.
Pay attention to the words you use as a leader. Are they the best words to explain your company and its role in people’s lives? Are you walking the talk and using the words consistently in your conversations and presentations?
Words matter because words lead to action.
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October 25, 2021 at 12:10AM
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A Leader’s Words Can Change A Culture - Forbes
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