We’re not managing performance - we’re sweating compliance!

 

March 2026

This is a comment made to me this week by a senior executive responding to my previous post, “What happened to 4 and 5?”

In manufacturing, when there’s no budget to replace equipment, there’s a phrase:
“Let’s sweat the asset.”

Push it harder. Stretch it further. Get more out of it than it was designed to give.

That works - up to a point.
Then performance drops.
 Breakdowns increase.
 And eventually, the asset fails.

We’re doing the same thing with people.
We’ve built systems that measure compliance -  and then we keep pushing those systems harder, expecting better performance.

 

More KPIs.
 More reviews.
 More pressure.

But nothing really changes.
Because the best compliance can give is consistency.
It cannot give you growth.
 It cannot give you ownership.
 It cannot give you excellence.

So what do you see in the business?
People doing what’s required—no more.
 Managers stuck at “meets expectations.”
 Performance that plateaus, no matter how much pressure you apply.

And then we ask:
“Why are we constantly only seeing 3 and not the 4 and 5?”

Because you can’t get performance  by sweating a compliance system.
At some point, the system itself becomes the constraint.
And until that changes nothing above it will move.

 

If you would like to talk to me, please call me on +27 82 465 5481 or email me on mark@meritbusiness.com

 

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