Concept
People Strategy
People strategy is Michael Gerber's idea that employees follow a business's systems with real care only when they understand the idea behind the work, know the rules of the game and can see the score.
In The E-Myth Revisited, Gerber places this after the operations manual and position contracts. Once systems are on paper, a quieter question appears: who will actually run them? Instructions alone buy compliance at best. A procedure doesn't run itself. It runs through people, and people need a reason. Gerber's answer is to design work as a game with three parts. The idea is what the work stands for, said plainly and explained before the rules. The rules are the system itself, so everyone knows what "done well" means. The score is a visible measure, updated often, so people know whether they're winning without waiting for the boss's verdict. Remove any one part and the game breaks. An idea without rules is a slogan. Rules without an idea become a checklist people follow only while the boss is watching. Without a score, nobody knows where they stand. The owner's job is to design the game, not to supervise every move.
A real-life example
A dental clinic owner wrote a 12-step sterilization checklist, and staff skipped steps whenever she was out. She changed three things. In a staff meeting she explained the idea: patients can't see sterility, so our care has to be invisible and total. She kept the checklist as the rules. She also posted a weekly tally in the break room showing trays fully logged versus total trays. Within a month the gaps closed, even on her days off.
How to use it
- 1Write the idea behind one key procedure in a single sentence your newest hire could repeat, and explain it before you hand over the steps.
- 2Check that the rules are written down and specific enough that two different people would do the task the same way.
- 3Pick one score people can see without asking you, update it at least weekly, and let the team track it themselves.