Concept
Purpose, people, process
Purpose, people and process are Julie Zhuo's three levers of management: does everyone know what we are trying to achieve and why; are the right people in the right roles, set up to succeed and growing; and how do we work together, decide, and know whether we are winning.
The three levers are a diagnostic before they are a to-do list. Every management problem a new manager meets in the first year is a problem with one of them, and naming which is half the fix. A missed deadline is rarely a people problem. It is usually a purpose problem (nobody knew which of three goals mattered most) or a process problem (the decision that would have unblocked it sat in someone's inbox). A team that argues in circles has a process gap; a team that is quiet and compliant has a purpose gap; a team where one person is drowning and another is bored has a people gap. A useful order when starting is the order of the levers: purpose first, because a team that can state the goal in one sentence can make most decisions without the manager; then people, in one-on-ones and hiring; then process, the meetings and rhythms that make the other two repeatable.
A real-life example
A warehouse team in Bursa keeps missing its same-day dispatch target. The new shift manager's instinct says it is a people problem: two slow pickers. Sorting by lever, she finds the target was never posted where the pickers could see it, and the rule for urgent orders had changed twice in a month. She fixes purpose and process, and the same two pickers hit the target the following week.
How to use it
- 1When something goes wrong, sort it: purpose, people or process, before deciding what to do.
- 2Start with purpose: one sentence the whole team can repeat, with two non-negotiables.
- 3Revisit the three in a weekly review; the lever that keeps failing is the one to redesign.