It has been a long time since I last made a post on my blog, but I hope that this post will give you some insight to what I have been diving into for the last couple of weeks. If you looked at the title of this blog you might be wondering why it says what it says. A BHAG is a goal that one sets that they never thought were possible for them. BHAG stands for Big Harry Audacious Goal. I am currently taking a course at Utah State called Speech 3250, Organizational Communications, and so far the class has opened my eyes to theories and styles concerning organizational communication. Jim Collins has written several books about organizational communication, among them are Built to Last and Good to Great, and I am fortunate enough to have those books as text books for my class. In his book Built to Last, Collins goes into great detail about BHAG's and the purpose and outcomes of them.
A quick story that involved a small company and a BHAG and the outcome of the BHAG. Have you ever heard of a Boeing jet? Did you know that way back when, America never thought that commercial airlines would be the mode of transportation in the United States? However, one company set out to make commercial Jets the mode of transportation. They set a BHAG to make the biggest jet that would carry passengers, all while keeping their standards of safety in check. Over a period of time Boeing accomplished their goal, even with large sums of money wasted in flight tests and a large number of lost jobs, they created what is now known as the 727 Boeing Jet and the 747 Boeing Jet. After seeing the success of the Boeing Jets, other companies tried to create a jet comparable to the Boeing but never really succeeded. All this was done by a gutsy BHAG. I am setting out to start my very first BHAG next week and I am very excited to see how this works out. I found an article that was posted talking about BHAG's and their purpose, so check it out if you have time. Here it is: http://theleanthinker.com/2009/06/22/the-purpose-of-a-bhag/
