The 'Good to Great' Bus Metaphor

A lot of people have referenced this metaphor since Collins' book came out.

When I stumbled upon Phil Gott's post contemplating the application of that bus metaphor for professional service firms, I found myself agreeing with his insights. Gott reflects on Collins' "do you have the right people on the bus?" and "are they in the right seats?" questions and he says:

...when you apply them to the typical professional service firm the whole thing (the metaphor and perhaps even the bus?) becomes unstable. You have to imagine a bus with dozens or perhaps thousands of different drivers (partners) all with some shared (or conflicting) influence over the steering. Add to that a good many jeering back-seat drivers, quite a number of who are straining on the hand brake. And then imagine that the bus has no particular destination or defined route. You wouldn’t expect such a bus to make much progress.

The more I reflect on this the more I struggle with Collins’s metaphor. I don’t know of any bus company that starts by choosing a collection of passengers and then says “OK, this is where I am going to take you.” No, the main bus company model is that there are lots of different buses all going in different directions. Passengers have to check the route number on the front of the bus and decide which bus they want to get on. They will stay on the bus only so long as it is taking them where they want to go. Then they get off.

For this bus metaphor to work, firms have to have a clear and declared destination and route (and most don’t), and individual professionals have to know where they want to go (and again, most don’t). Perhaps the metaphor does work after all. It’s professional firms – most of them anyway - that don’t.

'Tis true that, as Gott shows us, firms are built a bit backwards. Accountants would say we've "backed into" our passenger list and varied routes. My Grandpa used to say, "Do your feet smell and does your nose run? Then you're built backwards!"

Can we at least agree that we need our long term strategy first (destination and routes) before we determine if we have the infrastructure (fleet and drivers) to get there?

Maybe more people will come along for the ride (passengers) when we've established those first four things. Could this be a clue how to resolve the growing problems in recruiting and retention?