Have You Figured Out Your SMaC Recipe for Success?

A SMaC Recipe, from Jim Collins’ book Great by Choice, is a set of endur­ing oper­at­ing prin­ci­ples that cre­ates a replic­a­ble, con­sis­tent for­mu­la for success.

S — Specific

M — Methodical

A — And

C — Consistent

A client I work with, a sec­ond head­ing towards a third-gen­er­a­tion com­pa­ny, absolute­ly loved the cre­ation of their SMaC Recipe. Instilled by their founder & father and hand­ed down like a fam­i­ly heir­loom, from one gen­er­a­tion to the next, it’s strong list of dos and don’ts that tru­ly cap­ture the essence of every­thing learned from repeat­ed suc­cess­es and fail­ures overtime.

South­west SMaC List

One of my favorite SMaC lists comes from South­west Airlines:

1. Remain a short-haul car­ri­er, under two-hour segments.
2. Uti­lize the 737 as our pri­ma­ry air­craft for ten to twelve years. 
3. Con­tin­ued high air­craft uti­liza­tion and quick turns, ten min­utes in most cases. 
4. The pas­sen­ger is our #1 prod­uct. Do not car­ry air freight or mail, only small pack­ages which have high prof­itabil­i­ty and low han­dling costs. 
5. Con­tin­ued low fares and high fre­quen­cy of service.
6. Stay out of food services. 
7. No inter­lin­ing … costs in tick­et­ing, tar­iffs and com­put­ers and our unique air­ports do not lend them­selves to interlining. 
8. Retain Texas as our #1 pri­or­i­ty and only go inter­state if high-den­si­ty short-haul mar­kets are avail­able to us. 
9. Keep the fam­i­ly and peo­ple feel­ing in our ser­vice and fun atmos­phere aloft. We’re proud of our employees. 
10. Keep it sim­ple. Con­tin­ue cash-reg­is­ter tick­ets, ten-minute can­cel­la­tion of reser­va­tions at the gate in order to clear stand­bys, sim­pli­fied com­put­er sys­tem, free drinks in Exec­u­tive ser­vice, free cof­fee and donuts in the board­ing area, no seat selec­tion on board, tape-record­ed pas­sen­ger man­i­fest, bring air­planes and crews home to Dal­las each night, only on domi­cile and main­te­nance facility.

You can see that their SMaC list keeps them very focused on their way of win­ning and away from dis­trac­tions that could dilute their business.

Stay Focused

These are guid­ing prin­ci­ples that can help your team stay very focused on the wis­dom, gained over years, and the mis­takes you won’t repeat.

Once your SMaC list is devel­oped, review it quar­ter­ly and annu­al­ly, par­tic­u­lar­ly when reset­ting high-lev­el pri­or­i­ties for the next year and updat­ing your three-to-five-year plan.

Make sure you do not make any choic­es that vio­late or are incon­sis­tent with your SMaC list. 

The Chal­lenge

• If you already have a SMaC list and review it reg­u­lar­ly, congratulations!
• If you haven’t, what are some of the top dos or don’ts you would like to see endure for 10, 20 or 30 years in your company?
• How can you work with your team to get this list final­ized and built into your strate­gic plan­ning process?

Lis­ten to Episode 119 of The Growth Whisperers.

Lawrence & Co’s work focus­es on sus­tain­able and enhanced growth for you and your busi­ness. Our diverse and expe­ri­enced group of advi­sors can help your lead­ers and exec­u­tive teams stay com­pet­i­tive through the use of var­i­ous learn­ing tools includ­ing work­shops, webi­na­rs, exec­u­tive retreats, or one-to-one coaching.

We help high-achiev­ing lead­ers to have it all – a great busi­ness and a reward­ing life. Con­tact us for sim­ple and impact­ful advice. No BS. No fluff.