August 13, 2024
by Stephen T. Messenger
We just finished a move across the country and settled into our new home. The military is incredibly kind, hiring movers to pack, load, and unload all our things off the truck. They include an unpack service, where they will take everything out of the hundreds of moving boxes and place them on the counters, bed, or ground.
This unpacking service walks a fine line between helpfulness and complete chaos. After they’re finished (or until we cry mercy and ask them to stop) there is stuff everywhere—in every room. It’s up to us to place each item where it belongs; a frustratingly messy process where clutter, space limitations, and emotions all collide.
Here’s our theory. The kids, my wife, and I work on our bedrooms until they’re complete. Once a bedroom is done, there’s certainly cause for celebration! It feels so good to get a win. We celebrate together.
The person who just completed consolidates into another bedroom—we now have twice the effort! This manpower boost increases morale, and the two working together quickly and visibly frees up more rug area. Moreover, it helps visualize the finish line in that space. By the last room, we have five people working together quickly to unpack the place.
These three tasks are such important skills. Too often someone we know does something well, and we forget to celebrate with them. Or we accept the win without understanding how we can pool resources to get better. Or finally, we fail to use that victory as a foundation for achieving the next goal.
Once we generate wins we must celebrate. After the victory lap, it’s critical we take a moment to understand what that win did for us. Finally, we must take those realized gains and turn them into follow-on success. There is always another proverbial hill to take… or room to unpack.
Battle Drill 2
The U.S. Army has 14 battle drills which are designed for tactical situations. Soldiers ruthlessly practice them resulting in an automatic response when they encounter these situations for real. As a young infantry officer, I most likely practiced Battle Drill 2 more than any other: Conduct a Platoon Assault.
A U.S. infantry platoon typically has three rifle squads of nine soldiers and a weapons squad with a pair of machine gun teams. On patrol in a wooded area, a platoon often travels with four squads walking in a line, one after another. In this drill, the lead squad makes contact with a small enemy force such as an observation point, bunker, or trench line.
In this drill’s most simplified form, the bullets start flying, and the first squad establishes a support by fire position, laying down suppressive fire. The machine guns move forward and set up their heavy weapons to maximize pressure on the enemy.
Meanwhile, the follow-on squads maneuver either right or left under cover and assault the enemy position from the side. Those squads sweep across the target, destroy or capture the enemy force, and establish defensive positions on the far side. When given the signal, the support by fire position moves up on the target and secures the final portions.
Here’s where it gets interesting. First, while I wouldn’t call it a celebration, the squads certainly acknowledge the win that just occurred. The first line leaders immediately check on their soldiers for injuries, slap their helmets, and tell them good work.
Second, the platoon consolidates gains. This means the squad conducts activities to turn temporal success into long-term gains. They collect intelligence on the objective such as an enemy map, gather bad guy weapons and equipment, redistribute ammunition, and set conditions for follow-on activities.
Finally, the platoon reports their victory and moves out to look for more bad guys. These three actions of celebrating the wins, consolidating gains, and taking more ground create conditions to be victorious again in the future.
Winning on the Objective
As in a platoon assault, we all must routinely and consistently react well to any wins. The best organizations celebrate their victories, reset their positions, and then use that success to generate the next victory.
1. Celebrate the Wins. In a 2007 Harvard Business Study, 238 individuals from 26 different project teams across seven companies were interviewed to see what produced what they considered a “best day” at work. This was defined as their mood, emotions, and motivators at the end of the day.
Three-quarters of respondents stated they had “best day” when experiencing a win. Only 13% had a “best day” when they experienced a setback. Winning matters, and it’s so important to celebrate the little achievements.
We’re all programmed with a desire to achieve small victories, and we love telling others about it. In one journal entry from the study, a programmer wrote, “I smashed that bug that’s been frustrating me for almost a calendar week. That may not be an event to you, but I live a very drab life, so I’m all hyped.”
This person wanted to celebrate a small win, talk about it, and have someone acknowledge it. We all need to understand when our people are earning these small victories and celebrate with them.
2. Consolidate Gains. John Kotter states this is step number seven of eight of his change model. He argues that once short-term wins are made, it’s critical to recognize and build upon them. This may mean using that victory to influence other parts of the organization or taking on new tasks bolster the one just accomplished.
In my house moving example above, it means combining efforts to have two people work on a task instead of one. The phrase, “Many hands make light work,” from a 1300’s medieval English romance, Sir Bevis of Hampton, rings true when multiple efforts on the same project increase results.
It’s up to us to understand what gains we just made and how to leverage the additional morale, manpower, technology, efforts, or influence to take more ground in the future. Often, we’re the only people seeing the bigger picture and how everything works together. We must use resources efficiently and effectively for the good of the group.
3. Take More Ground. Winning leads to winning. In a 2015 NPR podcast called “Hidden Brain,” science correspondent Shankar Vedantam talks about how winning is contagious. He opines that someone who is successful today is more likely to be successful in the future, even compared to people of the same talent levels.
He references a Swedish study of professional golf players in the first round of a tournament. Only 65 scored high enough to make it to the next round. The researchers then looked at the ones who just barely made the cut and those that barely missed it (such as numbers 64 and 66)—basically the same skill levels.
The stats showed that those who made the cut were 3% more likely to win again in following tournaments than those who didn’t; they called it a “fairly substantial effect.” Ultimately, a positive mental state, confidence, and a history of winning makes a difference.
Take the Next Hill
Our job is to understand the next project or task and close with and destroy it. Once we achieve a small victory, we can use that to continue a winning streak.
Momentum is a powerful thing, and once we gain a win, it’s incumbent upon us to celebrate, consolidate gains, and continue taking more ground for our people and organization.
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Boots: Put Boots on the Ground
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Armor: Be Resilient to Life’s Attacks
Gun: Close with and Destroy the Enemy
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