Streamline Training & Documentation: Preach What You Practice

Saturday, April 22, 2006

Preach What You Practice

I first encountered the advice to "preach what you practice" in a sermon delivered a good number of years ago by William Muehl (a professor of divinity who also had a law degree). This idea was new to me and it made a huge impression. Muehl argued:

Failure to express the assumptions upon which one's actions are based can be the best defense in the world against an honest analysis of those actions. Suppose that you were called upon right now to preach a sermon, for example, using what you did yesterday as a storehouse of illustrations? ... Unless one is asked to do some such improbable thing ... the occasion to examine the quality of [one's] routine activities rarely arises.

Muehl was addressing the issue of honesty about motives and values in a religious context. I later came upon an equally compelling argument for "preaching what you practice" in the world of business.

In "Lead for Loyalty," a 2001 article in the Harvard Business Review, Frederick F. Reichheld of Bain & Company reports:

A study of the "loyalty leaders" — the companies with the most impressive credentials in [loyalty among customers, employees, suppliers, and shareholders] — has convinced me that ... outstanding loyalty is the direct result of the words and deeds — the decisions and practices — of committed top executives who have personal integrity.

Reichheld goes on to say that six concise principles capture the commonalities among the relationship strategies of the loyalty leaders. At the top of the list is "preach what you practice."

Here's Reichheld's summary of all six relationship strategies:

Preach what you practice. It's not enough to have the right values. You must clarify them and hammer them home to customers, employees, suppliers, and shareholders through your words and deeds.

Play to win-win. If you are to build loyalty, not only must your competitors lose. Your partners must win.

Be picky. At high loyalty companies, membership is a privilege. Clarify the difference between loyalty and tenure.

Keep it simple. In a complex world, people need small teams to simplify responsibility and accountability. They also need simple rules to guide their decision making.

Reward the right results. Save your best deals for your most loyal customers, and save your best opportunities for your most loyal employees and partners.

Listen hard, talk straight. Visit call centers, Internet chat rooms, and anywhere else customers offer feedback. Make it safe for employees to offer candid criticism. Use the Loyalty Acid Test survey. Explain what you've learned and communicate the actions that will be taken.

Just to round out the story ... The time-tested causal link underlying Reichheld's analysis is that greater loyalty means greater profits.

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Labels: Leadership

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