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Clarity First: How Smart Leaders and Organizations Achieve Outstanding Performance, by Karen Martin

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From the Back Cover

“How many of us have felt the tension of the boss asking, ‘So are we all on the same page?’ Just once I wanted to ask, ‘Which page, boss?’ The whiteboard, the e-mail summary, the yellow pad? That kind of ambiguity ruled my early work life and led to my deep professional disillusionment. I later learned, and Karen Martin shows us in Clarity First, it doesn't have to be that way!“For me, joy and clarity are inexorably linked as clarity leads not only to getting things done but getting the right things done right, and thus a chance to ‘work with pride,’ as W. Edwards Deming suggested was all that anyone wants from their work life. Karen Martin provides us, with Clarity First, the path to this kind of joy.”―Richard Sheridan, CEO of Menlo Innovations and author of Joy, Inc.“In a crowded and distracted world, leaders must develop clarity in order to rise above the competition, create better relationships, and grow their business. In this insightful book, Karen Martin gives us a clear vision for clarity.”―Sally Hogshead, New York Times bestselling author of Fascinate and How the World Sees You“Imagine the insanity of driving your car through a torrential downpour without windshield wipers. Far too often business leaders drive their company in this very way. In Clarity First, Karen Martin gives us a true gift: the organizational equivalent of high performance wiper blades to cut through ambiguity and achieve diamond-like clarity.”―Matthew E. May, author of Winning the Brain Game and The Laws of Subtraction â€œKaren focuses on, dissects, and gives excellent advice on how to address one of the most important weak points of conventional management: the lack of clarity. The need to operate with clarity permeates every aspect of what leaders and organizations do on a daily basis and is vital to be a high performer.”―Jeffrey Liker, bestselling author of The Toyota Way“In an effective organization, everybody should know at any given time what is the most important work they can do to contribute to its success, and how well they’re doing at it. However, in many organizations we find a miasma of overwork, poor strategy and communication, ill-defined or inadequate processes, and frustrated employees. In this outstanding book, Karen Martin tackles the biggest dysfunction addressing organizations today―a lack of clarity―and shows how to implement change at every level, supported by her extensive experience and her magisterial command of Lean thinking. This book is essential reading for leaders and managers everywhere.”―Jez Humble, coauthor of The DevOps Handbook, Lean Enterprise, and Continuous Delivery“Karen Martin does a masterful job of proving to readers why clarity is the key to outstanding performance, and showing what smart organizations can do to attain and sustain it. She maps a clear path to defining what winning is and how to get there. The chaos-cutting solutions and powerful clarity-enabling practices she shares are keenly relatable and immediately implementable. I was absolutely absorbed by each word, each page, each illuminating example and instructive concept.”―Billy R. Taylor, Director of North America Commercial and Off Highway Manufacturing at the Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company â€œKaren Martin writes, ‘Clarity exhibits many qualities, the most important of which are coherence, precision, and elegance.’ All are present in her latest book, Clarity First. Karen’s take on this timely and timeless topic is accessible, experience-based, relevant, and actionable. It should be required reading for leaders at all levels of an organization.”―Julie Winkle Giulioni, coauthor of Help Them Grow or Watch Them Go“To lead in the age of accelerated innovation, complexity, and speed relies on clarity. Your clarity of thought, communication and purpose enables leaders to achieve their desired outcomes, help others exceed their expectations and create higher performance organizations at scale. â€œIn this book, Karen highlights how clarity enables individuals and organizations to experiment, take necessary risks, and improve decision making to discover the breakthrough innovations of ongoing and future success. â€œClarity First will equip you with concrete capabilities and skills to deal with the uncertainty and ambiguity inherent in innovation―and win.”―Barry O’Reilly, founder and CEO of ExecCamp and coauthor of Lean Enterprise“Clarity First is a mantra for success―both now and in a future that increasingly rewards clarity and punishes certainty.”―Bob Johansen, PhD, Distinguished Fellow at the Institute for the Future and author of The New Leadership Literacies and Leaders Make the Future“Clarity First provides a much needed conduit between an organization’s purpose and performance, linking people development and the alignment of their goals across all levels, and helping create an environment where all employees understand their daily work and why they do it.  This excellent book paves the path for long-term success and sustainability within any industry.”―Tracey Richardson, founder of Teaching Lean Inc. and coauthor of The Toyota Engagement Equation â€œAt the heart of all good decisions and actions lies one of two factors, luck or clarity. We can hope that our employees, colleagues, or managers get lucky, or we can provide them with the information they need to be successful. Clarity is never easy to achieve. Indeed, every company I’ve worked with has had a crisis of clarity. In Clarity First, Karen Martin lays a course to provide a foundation of clarity for your company to build success in from the beginning.”―Jim Benson, author of Personal Kanban“Clarity is an essential but far too often overlooked foundation in the quest for success―both for organizations and individuals. Guided by this comprehensive and inspiring book, you will not fail.”―Joakim Ahlström, author of How to Succeed with Continuous Improvement“While most of Clarity First focuses on organizational clarity, the chapter that describes how to apply the concepts to the individual―from both personal and professional perspectives―is particularly powerful. As Karen puts it, ‘Organizational clarity begins with you.’ There are books that deal with self-help, and there are books that describe how to improve organizations, but it is, unfortunately, rare to find a book that truly forces the reader to confront the impact he or she directly has on the organization. Reflecting on this can lead to dramatic personal, and then organizational, clarity and improvement.”―Kevin Meyer, cofounder of Gemba Academy and author of The Simple Leader“In this terrific book, Karen Martin not only makes the compelling argument that clarity is needed―indeed, key―for success but also offers many practical tips to learn to gain greater clarity in one’s thinking and communicating. In this, clarity is a skill that can be practiced every day to better frame issues for oneself and to engage others and lead one’s business to superior performance. A must-read for any serious manager, clearly.”―Michael Ballé, coauthor of The Lean Strategy and The Gold Mine trilogy â€œNobody ever said, ‘I don’t need more clarity in my company!’ The reality is clarity can be elusive. But Karen Martin makes this essential outcome accessible, actionable, and possible. My favorite part is it’s possible in a totally human way. Brilliant!”―Shawn Murphy, CEO of Switch & Shift and author of The Optimistic Workplace“I coincidently finished reading Clarity First the day before going to Toyota Kyushu in South Japan. Although not by design, the timing was perfect and made all the examples described in the book even more vivid and validated during the plant visitation. Examples of the opposite are more abundant and not particular to any country or industry, but consequences are never positive. May this book be a guide for leaders who courageously seek achieving clarity first.”    ―Sammy Obara, CEO of Honsha.org“So often my work as a CEO is stymied because of confusion, chaos, and miscommunication.  Too often these symptoms are not caused by external factors but because of a lack of clarity inside my own organization. In this book, Karen Martin provides a concise road map for how to improve clarity. I’m putting it into practice, and it is working!  I know other leaders will benefit from more clarity, too.”―Daniel Wolcott, president and CEO of Adventist Health Lodi Memorial“In Clarity First, Karen Martin takes a direct and often tough approach to pierce the clouds of ambiguity in our working world. By citing specific examples in recent business headlines, Karen illuminates the problem of what a lack of clarity can do to financially devastate and damage a company and its reputation. But more than a thorough examination of why a lack of clarity can cause so many serious problems, Karen provides a lucid path to clarity for any organization or individual to follow. Clarity First is a great guide to successfully navigating the challenging waters of today’s uncertain business world.”―Jerry M. Wright, PE, MBA, LGC, LSSBB, former Chairman of the Board of the Association for Manufacturing Excellence“Clarity First is one of those rare books that captures timeless wisdom and makes it accessible to us all. If there is a single all-important element that is lacking in our organizations, as well as in our personal lives, it is clarity. This book effectively explores why clarity is essential to success, what we can do achieve it, and what steps we need to take to extend it throughout any organization. Bravo, Karen!”―Mike Orzen, coauthor of Lean IT“It is quite clear that Karen Martin understands what DePree meant when he said the ‘first job of a leader is to define reality.’ To paraphrase Lewis Carroll, ‘If you don’t know where you are going, any path will do.’ â€œKaren Martin gets it!  She understands, because of many decades of working with top companies, that everyone must be on the same page and be clear on the mission.”―Roger Greaves, former Chairman and founding CEO of Health Net, Inc.“Every organization needs a Karen Martin! With deft precision, Karen draws a straight line between clarity, or a lack thereof, to organizational performance. Organizational clarity is a competitive advantage.  A must-read packed with invaluable insights and easy-to-deploy solutions!”―Virginia Cattaneo, SVP Client Services at a global investment management organization â€œKaren Martin’s Clarity First successfully drives home a point we all need to hear! The clearer we get―in our processes, our org charts, our metrics, and our minds―the better our organizations will run. Let me be clear: we can all benefit from Karen’s in-depth look at what keeps us from getting clear and what we need to do to turn that around. Clarity is a gift, and Karen gives it to us with a wonderful intellectual and emotional generosity.” â€•Ari Weinzweig, cofounding partner of Zingerman’s Community of Businesses and author of the Zingerman’s Guide to Good Leading series“Karen Martin identifies a string of problems affecting organizations today: They do not see reality. They accept superficial understanding. They jump to conclusions. They do not investigate further. They tolerate inefficiency and mediocrity. Ultimately, they do not seek clarity. These organizations are at risk for survival. But Karen provides easily understood and necessary remedies, as well as sources and references for further reading, which will help any leader build a truly outstanding organization. Clarity First is an eye-opening and highly worthwhile practical guide for daily work."―Chote Sophonpanich, Chairman of Green Spot Co. Ltd.

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About the Author

Karen Martin, president of global consulting firm The Karen Martin Group, Inc., is a leading authority on Lean management and business performance improvement. A skilled change agent, she teaches effective ways to design work systems, grow market share, build organizational capabilities, and accelerate improvement. A popular keynote speaker, she is the author of The Outstanding Organization and coauthor of Value Stream Mapping, both Shingo Research Award winners, as well as coauthor of two other titles on business performance improvement.

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Product details

Hardcover: 320 pages

Publisher: McGraw-Hill Education; 1 edition (March 2, 2018)

Language: English

ISBN-10: 9781259837357

ISBN-13: 978-1259837357

ASIN: 1259837351

Product Dimensions:

6.4 x 1.2 x 9.2 inches

Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)

Average Customer Review:

4.5 out of 5 stars

33 customer reviews

Amazon Best Sellers Rank:

#62,903 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Karen Martin always sees through issues to their core and communicates to the reader/listener in a clear, concise manner. With this knowledge she is able to give direction for implementation of business principles. Her writing style is clear with a good mix of concepts and concrete examples to make them clear. She doesn't disappoint in Clarity First. Martin synthesizes principles from both inside and outside the business world such as Carol Dweck from cognitive education, and Daniel Goleman. She has a through knowledge of lean and the principles from the Toyota Production System. This makes application of her work possible to business, education and government organizations. I've found this book and her earlier Value Stream Mapping indispensable in my work in consulting both for business and education.

By starting with "Clarity First" whatever you do next is easier. This book covers why you need clarity, why you don't have clarity and what you can do to get it. One section that I particularly appreciated was the definitions that followed "organizations confuse purpose with its cousins: mission, vision, values, and guiding principles. Each of these elements is different, but I regularly see them used interchangeably with each other, and with purpose. They are not the same." I too have seen organizations struggle with those topics, but Karen's definitions are succinct and easy to digest as is the whole book. Improving clarity in your business and personal life is a value add activity and this book provides great insights and examples. On a technology note I am typically a person who learns best by highlighting the physical book as I read, but bought this for Kindle on PC - it worked well and provided some additional benefits of organizing my notes and being able to quickly review my highlighted material. Fred Miller

I have literally highlighted my whole book, as there were so many times that my mind seemed to burst with news thoughts and ideas that were spurred by how things were organizes, presented, and written. Immediate applications to helping me and my workers be more successful. I'm going to recommend this as a book for all to read, thanks!!

I like the observation that everyone agrees that clarity is good, but the reason why most of us don’t strive for clarity is that it takes hard work on the front end to achieve it.

“Ambiguity is the corporate default state, a condition so pervasive that ‘tolerance for ambiguity’ has become a cliché of corporate job postings, a must-have character trait for candidates.”Are you annoyed by ambiguity? Vexed by vagueness? Do you find it hard to get things done amidst corporate confusion? Karen Martin has the answer. Her new book Clarity First is a clarion call to leaders to get their houses in order. She describes her role as having to “push you to face the hard truths” and the truth shall set you on the path to greatness.In keeping with the message, the book is an easy read, and Ms. Martin is generous with examples from her own experience which is broad and deep. Financial services firms, government agencies, engineering firms and hospitals serve as great vehicles to bring her points home. The book is rich in detail, structure, sample visuals, tools, concepts and everything needed to achieve outstanding performance.One of the hard truths is that you have to actually do the work. Her guidance is not something to hand off to middle managers. Everyone is involved at every level. Throughout the book she urges leaders to develop clarity by learning for themselves. Going to where the work happens — the “Gemba” — is critical as you work toward clarity.The book flows easily from the macro-organizational effort down to tips on how to foster clarity at a personal level. One great specific suggestion is for leaders to avoid acronyms since they can confuse recipients. That resonated since the inside joke in the process improvement community is that you shouldn’t use” TRLs” — Three Letter Acronyms. They save you time but force others to translate. It’s a false economy.The book is structured around the “Five Ps:” Purpose, Priorities, Process, Performance and Problem Solving. It's a nice, straightforward structure, and she appropriately begins with Purpose.1. PurposeUnderstanding why an organization exists seems so basic it’s surprising how many organizations are unclear on that point. In her experience, millennials will choose purpose-driven jobs over higher-salaried jobs in organizations that are not purpose-driven. They are a critical workforce so if your organization suffers from high turnover this chapter is for you.She also makes clear that “making money” is no substitute – profit is not purpose. “Making money is an outcome of providing a desired or needed good or service in a way that meets the quality and price expectations of your customers.” That’s often a surprise for people but it’s a critical distinction since it can make the difference between fostering an inspired workforce or driving a broken internal culture like Wells Fargo.“With clear purpose, priorities are easier to set, creativity can be funneled in the best directions, and problems are easier to surface. Knowing why you do what you do contributes to clarity about how to handle an emerging problem or business opportunity.”CVS is a great public example of purpose in action. They began as a convenience store with a pharmacy attached, but they changed their purpose to, “Helping people on their path to better health.” They even changed their name to “CVS Health” (I’ll bet you don’t even know what CVS stands for: Customer Value Stores — Another victim of the “TRL”). Once they made that change, it became clear that selling tobacco conflicted with their purpose. In spite of dire predictions, removing cigarettes didn't hurt their bottom line – just the opposite.2. PrioritiesOnce organizational purpose is clear, it’s time to prioritize. This is where strategy comes into play. Prioritizing at a basic level means deciding not just what’s important, but what’s not important. Another hard truth is you can’t do it all. With that in mind, one of her first efforts is to help organizations determine what’s in their two “buckets” of work.The first bucket is the “work it takes to run the organization on the daily basis.” The second bucket is “special efforts” that are not part of day to day activities. What she discovers is that leaders are not always aware of the amount of manpower going into that second bucket. If they were, they might choose to apply their resources elsewhere.Strategy Deployment (aka Hoshin Kanri) is a great way to clarify which special projects take precedence. She’s clear this is a company-wide effort. It involves a top down and a coinciding bottom up sharing of information and priorities. By engaging in this two-way communication, a technique called “Catchball,” organizations get goal clarity while building a strong, clear problem-solving culture. This brings us to Process.3. Process“Everything a business does – in fact, everything in life – occurs as a result of processes. Yet few leaders overtly advocate for process to the extent needed for clarity.”Whereas purpose is the “why” – process is the “how.” She rightly points out that leaders routinely miss how process clarity is critical for the business. A well designed, executed and managed process enables employees to operate at their best.Instead, people assume rework is just the “cost of doing business.” Ms. Martin encourages her clients to measure how often their employees engage in rework, the “Hidden Beast” as her colleague Mike Osterling puts it. By calculating the percent complete and accurate (%CA) you can illuminate the waste in a process.She’s also clear that you don’t need specialists to achieve high-performing processes. “Processes that are impeccably designed, clearly understood, relentlessly followed, and regularly improved don’t require heroics. People with average skill sets can still perform them at high levels.” It’s not hard, but it does take time.4. PerformancePerformance answers the question, “How well are you doing?” Once you’ve got well managed processes, you need to know how they’re performing. That requires developing Key Performance Indicators (KPIs). She has great examples of how choosing a few key measures helps organizations focus and make the right decisions.She makes a great case for ensuring these indicators are visual and accessible. A spreadsheet on somebody’s hard drive doesn’t do anyone any good. She also offers guidance on what to measure. It’s important to track both what’s “critical to the business” and “critical to the customer.”She cautions against creating too many measures. The problem with trying to measure everything is that it leaves organizations data rich and information poor. To stay focused, the top level scorecards should have no more than nine Key Process Indicators. Once the scorecards are narrowed down and populated it’s time to get to the heart of the matter: problem solving.5. Problem SolvingThis is a rich section covering how to select problems, state problems, solve problems and be a good problem-solving coach. One perfect revelation is that what organizations need to solve are problems, not opportunities. “Opportunity” is just a confusing positive spin on process issues and she dispenses with that term in short order. Fuzzy euphemisms are everywhere — and they just get in the way.The point is to focus on reducing the gap between where a process ought to be, and where it is now. Her advice is to make problems visible and work to understand the current state. She stresses that building understanding takes time, “speed is not your friend.” Give problem solvers the time to do the job right. She’s quite clear about the role of leaders. “Problem-solving skill building is the most important aspect of people development. Viewed through this lens, problem-solving coaching is the primary role of the leader.”Wrapping It UpShe concludes the book with a personal “You” section and a call to action. She encourages her readers to build and nurture curiosity. Seek clarity by asking questions. She’s mindful that people, especially those in positions of authority, are reluctant to admit to ignorance. It’s important to fight this mindset. When people see their leaders asking questions, that’s a signal that it’s okay for everyone to seek answers. And you need an inquisitive culture to achieve any clarity.“Good questions are a sign of wisdom and deep thinking. When tackling an issue, take some time to frame what you want to know and why you want to know it. What will you do with the information?”Karen Martin has written a wonderful “tough love” guide for leaders to systematically clear away chaos and confusion and bring their organizations to operational excellence. She bravely discusses the feelings involved in this kind of work. The feeling that prevents people from seeking clarity – fear – and the feelings that grab your heart – excitement and pride in serving others. She’s even got a great addendum on how to meditate. Such a refreshing voice in a field that often lacks passion.In her words, “Clarity is a gift – go on and give it.”

she speaks too fast for me.

Karen builds on her previous award-winning book The Outstanding Organization by digging deeper into one of that book's key topics, clarity. Clarity is the antidote to ambiguity, which has become the default state for many companies. Ambiguity is what happens when priorities are uncertain or even conflicting, when leaders can’t explain what success looks like, or what aspects of performance matter most. Ambiguity saps energy from talented team members. In this book, Karen shows how to eliminate the ambiguity in your organization -- and improve performance -- by starting with clarity.

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