Made from Beer?

Catchy title huh? It's actually one of the advertising slogans for an Australian beer - Carlton Draught. (More about Carlton Draught?) And if you haven't seen the commercial based around Flashdance's signature tune, then check that out too.

But what has made from beer got to do with leadership or teambuilding?

As my bus trundled past a billboard with this slogan on it the other day, it got me to thinking about how many organisations could really describe themselves as being made from people. Yeah, I know; not as catchy as made from beer, but the same message is implied.

There's lots of fancy marketing and other gimmicks to promote the fermented amber liquid yeast product that is so popular here in Australia. And of course, the angle that the cunning Carlton marketers are taking is: fundamentally all we want is a beer that's ... made from beer. Everything else is secondary.

The same can be said for many organisations. Lots of fancy marketing to suggest that they're innovative, have super cool IT systems, bleeding edge architect-designed corporate headquarters, high-end manufacturing technologies and whatever. But fundamentally, they're made from people.

A few years ago I was giving a talk to a bunch of junior naval officers on what my expectations were of them out in the Fleet. Our Navy takes a great deal of pride in its ships, aircraft and other technology, and a lot of the questions I had got leading up to this talk were what were we doing about some new project, some new process or whatever? I used the title of the American cyclist Lance Armstrong's biography to emphasise my message. (More about Lance?)

Lance's biography is, of course, entitled It's not about the bike. This to me encapsulates a lot of what I was trying to say. Without doubt, Lance was the preeminent road racing cyclist of the last decade - perhaps ever. Yep, he had some amazing technology to ride, a terrific team around him. But those things were available to other riders, but they didn't have the same success. So there must have been something else.

To my audience of junior naval officers the point was, don't just concern yourselves with the technology, the tactics, the qualifications, etc. It's not just about that. It's about the poeople. It's about leading them. It's about working with them in teams - and everything that leading them and working with these teams entails. Everything starts with the people - for all organisations. It's not about bikes. Organisations are made from people.