All organizations aim to succeed. In many ways, it’s easy to gauge success using standard measures like ROI, stock value and profit. The fact is, while profit drives most organizations sustainable success relies on having the right people who can translate organizational strategies and objectives into long-term growth.
Preoccupation with short-term monetary gains is detrimental to managerial effectiveness.
A Financially-Driven Culture Can Impede Management Objectives
Particularly in uncertain or difficult economic times, organizations tend to zone in on returns. Budgets are slashed, lay offs take place and everyone from the CEO on down is focused exclusively on monthly or quarterly returns. The problem is that everyone is thinking short-term gain as opposed to long-term growth. As a result, managers are doing more with less, are more over-worked than ever and people at all levels of the organization are choosing their own priorities.
The result? Initiatives stop moving forward and the organization stagnates.
Diminishing Manager-Subordinate Relationships
On the one hand, managers need to be sufficiently immersed in the day-to-day operations of the organization to be able to give appropriate direction to their subordinates. Managers need to foster team work, promote creativity, lead innovation, and build confidence in employees that leads to improved performance and output. But focusing on short-term financial gains will inevitably erode important manager-subordinate relationships and hinder long-term employee satisfaction and sustainability. This is a lose-lose, because neither the manager nor the subordinates will be able to carve out enough time to do the value-added, strategic work that they must for long-term success. The result? Ineffectiveness, decreased work performance, and diminished output.
Managing for short-term gain rather than long-term growth is one of the biggest mistakes leaders make today. In fact, a short-term orientation that focuses exclusively on returns is counterproductive to long-term success of the organization.
Learning how to balance managing day-to-day operations with growth strategies can be challenging. Nevertheless, keeping an appropriately long-term vision in sight is imperative for both the organization and its managers to succeed. Part of the job of a manager is to create this balance for themselves. Equally important, they need to assure that their subordinates are also balance the longer term with the day to day.
