When I say jump...

“How High?”

We have all heard this at one time or another. It is usually associated with someone making it clear who is the boss.

But I have often thought of this quote in parallel to the following famous vaudeville joke:

Q. How’s your wife?

A. Compared to what?

Both of these well-know and overused clichés hit at the same central point. That in order to succeed and improve you must have a standard to compare your performance to.

That is why the correct response to the “boss” who says “jump!” is not bending our legs and powering up, but is instead an emphatic request for clarification on the standard I have to meet to be successful. The same point is made in the old joke. Obviously, this is not the only point either quote makes, but they both point out this vital point.

This vital aspect is the idea that improvement comes from setting a standard. It is the basis for improvement, much like discipline is the basis for morale as we discussed last week. Without a standard, improvement is a haphazard, wandering effort that is difficult to spot, harder to measure and impossible to maintain. With a standard improvement is easy to see, measure and maintain. Which is the world you would want to work in?

So when you look around, stop and ask “if I asked everyone to ‘Jump’ would they know how high”? Anywhere that the answer is not 100% locked down there is a great opportunity to set the stage for continued improvement.