Center for Simplified Strategic Planning

Category: Strategy Implementation

  • Internal Communications for Effective Strategic Implementation

    Strategic Planning Expert
    Strategic Planning Expert

    by M. Dana Baldwin

    One oft-forgotten practice which should be considered even more important during this turbulent time is communications within your company. As you might consider once you reflect on the situation within your company, people are concerned about their futures, the future of the company and generally how things are going.

    There are a number of elements which you should include in your planning for your internal communications:

    First: To whom are you addressing your communication? When you want to get a message across to parts or all of your company personnel, you should determine which group you are addressing, so your communication is couched in terms that are meaningful and relevant to that specific group. Generally, one doesn’t speak to engineers the same way that one addresses accounting or purchasing people. This is not because they are not all capable of absorbing your message, but rather because you want to make it as easy for them to get the points you are trying to deliver in the most effective manner for them to understand and remember.

    Second: After determining how you should address each group to get the best from the interaction, you need to be very specific about the message you are trying to communicate. You need to be clear, unambiguous and direct. Do not hint at what you are trying to say, bring it out loud and clear. Be specific and don’t ramble. Don’t make excuses and don’t apologize for laying out the facts and their impacts on the company. It is important for everyone hearing your message to believe that you are being open and forthright. If they can’t trust you to be honest with them, they won’t accept the validity of your message.

    Third: Be sure to take time to build your message carefully. It is imperative that you say what you need to say, and that you are very clear in what you are planning to do. Think about what the impact of your words will be on your audience. Don’t scare them if there is little reason to do so. But don’t pull your punches either. Be sure you have a clear understanding of not only what you will say, but how you will say it, as both parts of the message will be read by your audience, and if your body language and actual words are not consistent with your intent, they will perceive this, and will not trust your communication.

    Fourth: Make your message one which they will remember. As stated above, clarity and consistency are vital. Be clear, be memorable to the extent appropriate to the message, and the audience will respond as well as can be expected under the circumstances. In order to get your point across, follow the old rule about speeches: Tell them what you are going to tell them. Tell them. Tell them what you have told them. Do all of this in terms that your audience will respond to and will remember.

    Fifth: The final point to make here is that once you make a commitment to your audience, you must live up to it. If circumstances change in such a way to prevent your being able to follow through as you originally committed, you need to bring the group back together, explain what has happened that prevents your meeting your commitment, and explain to the group what the new direction is, and why it is appropriate for you to change direction.

    With consistent, appropriate communications, and good follow-through, your team will appreciate your efforts to communicate effectively, and you should get better buy-in to your aims and goals, and better understanding of the reasons you have for the actions you have selected.

    Dana Baldwin is a Senior Consultant with Center for Simplified Strategic Planning, Inc. He can be reached at baldwin@cssp.com.

  • Retaining Your Customers

    Strategic Planning Expert
    Strategic Planning Expert

    These are difficult times for many companies. For some this may be an understatement, for others not so much of one. Stepping back and looking at your business from the outside, are there things you should consider concentrating on and/or doing better to keep those customers you have? Chances are that there are a number of things you could do to improve your communications with and relationships with your current customers.

    Even if many of your customers are not able to buy as much as they were buying a year or two ago, with their business shrinking to some degree, it is worthwhile to make every reasonable effort to keep these customers as happy as you can with what you offer, be it product or service based (or both).

    There are three simple reasons for this effort to be made. First: You need to make every sale you can to keep your own business viable during this slowdown period. Second: You should aim to retain as much of their business as you possibly can so when the turnaround comes, you have built on your relationship with each customer to the best possible extent. The goal here is to be the source for each customer’s needs when business returns to higher volumes. Third: Current customers are usually less expensive to keep than new customers are to find, develop and cultivate into regular customers.

    How can we do this in an environment where everyone is looking to cut costs, reduce staffing and/or minimize inventory investment in order to survive these difficult times?

    Read More (case study included)

  • Why don’t we complete our strategic objectives?

    This is one of the toughest questions to answer for most people who do strategic planning. The average company that does strategic planning typically achieves only 30% of their objectives. Since your strategic objectives represent the highest priority initiatives in your organization, why would that number be so low?

    First, we must recognize that strategy is never urgent until it’s too late. The time to make strategic changes is well ahead of when they are needed. There is an unfortunate trade off where you can trade money for time, and finish sooner. No company considers these major initiatives urgent until the strategic issues are eating away at your profits, and – by that time – you are unlikely to have enough money to overcome the urgency factor. What this means is that we can always postpone strategic decisions and convince ourselves that failure to change this year won’t kill your company. This is usually true – but the cumulative effect of years of strategic procrastination has killed thousands of businesses.

    Secondly, we must recognize that, like most people who have to implement strategic initiatives, we have urgent routine tasks to handle every day. Unless you are running a Fortune 50 company (and even then!), your team must split their time between the routine (what many consider to be “my job”) and the strategic. Given the postponable nature of strategic objectives, it’s understandable that strategy implementation almost always loses out in that competition.

    Thirdly, in strategic planning there is almost always a fear that we won’t pick the right objectives. This leads to setting too many objectives, and it also contributes to setting objectives that are nearly impossible. There is nowhere where our managerial appetite to bite off more than we can chew is more apparent.

    In my 2,000 plus strategic planning meetings, I’ve seen people set well over 5,000 strategic objectives in companies of all sizes. We’ve track data on strategic objective execution since 1997. From that data, I can tell you that there are five things you can do to hit the highest level of effectiveness in strategy execution:

    1. Set a reasonable number of objectives

    When someone calls to discuss their strategy execution, I usually start by asking “How many strategic objectives did you set?” This is because the number of objectives will – regardless of the size of the objective or the company – directly affect what you will get done. The correct number, for every single company in our sample, is somewhere between 5 (for the smallest teams) and 10 (for the largest teams). Even in very large companies – and we’ve don’t this with companies that have over 50,000 employees – the number of objectives successfully completed drops after you hit around 10. This is simply an execution-relation expression of the idea of focus – try to get 20 things done, and you’re more likely to get halfway done with most of them instead of 100% done with 10.

    2. Write your objectives well

    Most people who spend time around strategic planning will be familiar with the SMART objective. SMART is an acronym that means:

    Specific – it clearly states what will be accomplished
    Measurable – the objective results in a objectively measurable outcome (even if it’s just true/false)
    Achievable – the objective is realistic and possible with the resources you have
    Result – the objective is stated as the result you intend, not an action (ie “sell 10,000 cars” and NOT “introduce a new car model”)
    Timely – the objective has a realistic deadline, based on resource availability, which will allow ongoing management of implementation activities.

    3. Create an action plan of well-defined steps to complete the objective

    Action plans are critical to good execution. Breaking down any objective implementation into finite, manageable steps gives you the ability to tackle it as a project and manage focused execution over the course of months. A good action plan clearly tells you what you will need to do at each step of the way, so you don’t waste time trying to figure out what the next step is when you get to it.

    4. Schedule actions based on resource availability – both time AND money

    Many companies do plan their strategic projects with budgets, but my experience shows that money is rarely the limiting resource in objective execution – time is. This is at least partly because strategic projects usually require dedicated time from top executives in your organization for management, tracking and decision making at key points. When those executives run out of time, it’s often impossible to find more time, which results in the project being delayed. Since strategic activity is rarely urgent, these delays often result in the failure of the entire project.

    5. Monitor your execution by checking in on each scheduled action step MONTHLY

    This is another critical item. If you plan the action steps required to complete your objective and schedule those activities based on resource availability, you will have a calendar of actions which must be taken to complete the objective on time. Because these are postponable activities, a system that drives urgency for the scheduled completion of the steps makes a big difference. We have found that annual reviews tend to drive 10-20% of objectives to be a year late, quarterly reviews drive some to be a quarter late, and monthly reviews drive a higher completion rate with most late objectives being completed about a month late. One hour or so even month checking in with the entire team on progress on each action plan will give you significantly better results.
    The average company doing strategic planning without these systemic approaches will likely achieve about 30% of their objectives. If you use all five on these ideas, you should be able to achieve 80-90% of the objectives you set in your strategic planning each year.

  • Strategic Performance

    One of the great challenges in executing a strategic plan is getting the team to perform and be motivated by the strategy. Indeed, strategic performance in implementation is the achilles heel of strategic planning.  It’s common to hear people say “We did strategic planning, but it didn’t change anything.”  Obviously, the way you approach strategic planning should be oriented to getting better strategic performance from your whole organization. It turns out that by looking at things that enhance individual performance, we can find corollaries in team performance that are very useful for executing your strategic plan.

     

    We often pay so much attention to the strategy that we disregard the challenges of execution.  By thinking about how you can enhance the performance of your executive team in strategy implementation, we can achieve much better results.

     

    There are three main elements that will increase your teams performance in a strategic plan. These elements are

    1. Midpoint goals.
    2. Visualizing immediate success.
    3. Framing a strategy uniquely.

    Strategic Performance from Mid-point goals

    Focusing on midpoint goals is common sense in many situations. If you are looking for a spouse, you don’t run into a crowd of people and start introducing yourself as a prospective future spouse. A commonsense approach to this is to take the process in steps. That means you start with an introduction.  Once you are introduced, you don’t propose marriage – you propose a date, and then maybe some more dates. There are two reasons why this works. First, we make much better progress if we work towards the small steps that lead to the big change. Second, people can feel overwhelmed by a seemingly impossible large goal. While some people who thrive on an audacious goal, most people will feel overwhelmed.  They may not take action on an audacious goal unless you give them concrete steps that they can take today that way I have a payoff in the near future.

    In Simplified Strategic Planning, we achieve this result in two ways.  First, we set annual objectives that are possibly intermediary steps to achieving the longer-term vision.  Second, we create action plans by splitting those objectives into smaller, more easily attained steps.

    Strategic Performance from Visualization

    The next approach, visualizing success, has some excellent examples available in real world business. For example, consider the pink Cadillac used at Mary Kay cosmetics. Leading salespeople are shown pink Cadillacs owned by higher level salespeople in the organization. These pink Cadillacs are awarded by the organization to salespeople who surpass $1 million in sales. At sales events, salespeople are encouraged to experience the reward.  They don’t just look at the pink Cadillac but get behind the wheel and imagine themselves getting one of these for exceeding $1 million in sales. This visualization creates an immediacy of the reward and starts the brain down the pathways that lead to the ultimate achievement.

    A skilled facilitator will use this visualization technique in several points in the strategic planning process.  For example, when thinking of opportunities, it’s useful to ask the team to imagine a successful future.  By thinking about how they reach that point, the team will have an easier way to identify strategically useful opportunities.

    Strategic Performance from Re-framing

    The third technique, reframing is as useful as a strategic tool as it is as a motivation and performance tool. The idea here is to reframe what your company is doing.  It’s best to do this uniquely so that people think of themselves as doing something interesting and unusual. The reason this is often a good strategy tool, is that reframing often helps reorient the organization.  For strategic purposes, we want to move towards an entirely different approach to competing in the marketplace with this new orientation. A good example of this is Southwest Airlines in the 1980s.  Southwest famously began thinking of themselves not as competing with other airlines, but as competing with the bus and the train. This reframing was built around and understanding of competing and serving the fundamental need of the customer, rather than focusing on the way that need is met.

    Strategic Performance Improvement

    The application of each of these three approaches has been demonstrated to improve individual performance. In Clearer, Closer, Better: How Successful People See the World, by Emily Balcetis, we see examples of controlled studies of individual performance varying tasks, whether athletic or mental in nature.  These studies showed that these three techniques can measurably improve how well people perform.  By using these techniques with your team, you should also be able not just to motivate the individuals in the team but you enhance the performance and the alignment of your entire management team.

    If you would like to apply these approaches to your own strategic plan in a way that will yield better implementation and more effective growth and profitability, click on the link below to attend our next virtual program on strategic thinking, or contact us to discuss how we can actually turn this into reality in your organization through the strategic planning process

     

     

  • How to Improve Your Strategy Implementation and Implement-ability

    Strategy Implementation
    Strategy Implementation

    What is your biggest strategic planning problem?  

    I always ask seminar attendees “What is your biggest strategic planning problem right now?”  I inevitably hear the response “Strategy Implementation”. Without question, this is one of the biggest issues for any company trying to accomplish anything at a strategic level.  Execution seems to inevitably fall short of stated intentions. As one CEO put it, “We say we will do something, and get excited about it, but a month later, it’s forgotten.”  This is perhaps true even when attempting to implement non-strategic objectives — but it’s far worse with the strategic ones. Why? Because nothing is more postpone-able than a strategic objective — until it’s too late to even think strategically. In addition, strategic objectives are much more likely to introduce powerful changes in your organization.  Therefore, they meet with far greater resistance than more operationally oriented objectives.

    Strategic Planning Expert Robert W. Bradford
    Strategic Planning Expert
    Robert W. Bradford


    Enhance your effectiveness at strategy implementation by the things you choose to do in your strategic planning process.

    There are three key areas where you can do this: 1. Implementation Planning, 2. Resource Allocation and 3. Implementation Monitoring. The approach we take to these three areas is quite different from the norm in strategic planning, and it yields superior results. According to Robert Half Associates, most companies achieve about 30% of the objectives they set for themselves in a process like strategic planning. Using Simplified Strategic Planning, you should be able to achieve an average that is closer to 80%. It is the unusual way we handle the three key implementation management steps that makes the difference.

    Strategy Implementation – Implementation Planning

    First, in implementation planning, it is important to set objectives well.  This means using the SMART approach — objective must be specific, measurable, achievable, with results stated in a timely way. In addition, you should make sure you set a reasonable number of objectives. We find many companies improve their execution effectiveness simply by limited the objectives they set in strategic planning. Secondly, you need to write a good, clear action plan that is useful for directing and tracking the implementation of your objectives. The approach illustrated in the Simplified Strategic Planning manual, seminar and book is a robust way to assure this.

    Strategy Implementation – Resource Allocation

    In resource allocation, we find that most organizations already pay a great deal of attention to the money required for effective implementation. This is the first resource you should look at. Money is important, but it is usually less important in strategy implementation than time. Ironically, few companies devote even half as much attention to time as they devote to money.

    Strategy Implementation – Monitoring

    Finally, monitoring of strategy implementation is vital, even if it is sometimes difficult. This implies two important things. First, you must write your action plans to be monitor-able.  This means the steps should be stated as clear, finite actions which are considered complete at some point.   Also, each step needs a clearly stated start and completion date.

    Assure that your team follows the recommendations in all three of these areas and you will find your implementation will improve dramatically.

    For great ideas on how to improve the quality of you planning, contact me at rbradford@cssp.com.  Consider holding a one-day workshop on Simplified Strategic Planning. In-house Workshop

    To learn more about the Strategic Value of Values, click here.

    To learn why Stable Strategic Planning Powers Your Success, click here.

    Robert Bradford is President/CEO of the Center for Simplified Strategic Planning, Inc.  He can be reached at rbradford@cssp.com.
    © Copyright 2019 by Center for Simplified Strategic Planning, Inc., Ann Arbor, MI — Reprint permission granted with full attribution

  • Successful Objectives – The What and the Why

    Objectives
    Objectives

    Objectives are one of the key outputs of the strategic planning process. Your team’s strategic planning discussions accomplish three broad results.

    First and foremost are your strategies:

    Strategies are your sense of vision as to the course and direction of the company.  What will you do in each of your market segments – your core businesses?  Select one of five options (expand, maintain, contract, milk or withdraw) for each market strategy.  Select a competitive strategy for each market segment (specialty or commodity, mass market or niche).

    What new things will you do outside of your core businesses? This could include new products or services.  You could also consider new capabilities to expand your ability to improve your current or new products or services.  Expanding into new territories or new markets, etc. is a possibility.  Finally, think about how you could develop and improve your organization and your people.

    Next your team sets the objectives which come from your strategy.

    Objectives are specific, significant, achievable, challenging, measurable, time-related statements of intended future results the accomplishment of which will lead to the attainment of the strategies.  It is essential that the objectives be focused on the strategy in order to prevent irrelevant activities.  Do not write objectives for “business as usual”.  Be careful that your objectives are stated as results rather than activities.  There should be no more than 8-10 objectives.  It is better to have too few than too many.

    Objectives may arise from many different parts of the discussions that make up the analysis that results in the overall plan. Frequently they arise from your discussions of strategic issues.  Those are issues which affect the overall course and direction of the organization. They may encompass new activities necessary to enable your strategies to be implemented and executed.

    Write structured action plans for each of your objectives. Then develop budgets and schedules to show available time and money.

    Action Plans are what translate objectives into results.  Use the action plan template to identify the necessary actions, the people involved and the time and money required.  After developing budgets and schedules, starting with the highest priority action plan, fill in start and completion dates for each step applying the available time and money.

    With monthly monitoring sessions, the entire strategic planning team will be kept informed of action plan progress.

    The action plan team will thereby be more likely to stay on track and to meet their commitments. Experience has taught us that merely setting objectives results in about 20% of objectives being completed. By writing an action plan but not assigning responsibilities or dates, the completion rate increases to about 50%. When a company follows and monitors its action plans, it completes at least 80-90% of its objectives on time and within budget.

    If your team needs guidance to effectively select and plan your objectives and to execute your action plans, please email me at baldwin@cssp.com or call me at 616-575-3193.  Consider holding an inexpensive one-day workshop on Simplified Strategic Planning.

    In-house Workshop

    For more about “Implementation Pitfalls”, click here.

    M. Dana Baldwin is Senior Strategist with Center for Simplified Strategic Planning, Inc. He can be reached by email at: baldwin@cssp.com

  • Strategy Execution Problem?

    Strategy Execution Problem
    Strategy Execution Problem

    As you know from the Simplified Strategic Planning book and seminar, execution is the Achilles’ heel of strategic planning.  Although the Simplified Strategic Planning approach is the best approach to strategy execution we’ve seen, your execution may fall behind.  So – what is the best way to handle getting behind in your strategy execution?

    First, it’s important to remember that we put a schedule on the action plan tasks to give them priority

    Without that schedule, your action plan steps become just another postpone-able activity.  Since your team is already quite busy, allowing postponement will lead to slower and slower execution.  Some steps won’t cause mayhem, however, if they are completed a little late.

    We want to treat the execution schedule as important, though, and that means we must resolve the issue

    Remember, there are five main reasons for strategy execution problems:

    1. Overestimating the resources available
    2. Underestimating the resources required
    3. Allocating the wrong resources
    4. The action relies on some external actor, like a customer, who may not share our priorities.
    5. Intrusion of an urgent matter

    Paying close attention to the scheduling process will help with issues 1 and 2 – but that won’t eliminate the issues

    Over time, you will get better at making these estimates, but when you do encounter resource issues, consider these steps:

    1. Acknowledge that there was a mismatch between your estimates and reality.
    2. Learn from that mismatch.
    3. Examine how you can either add resources available or decrease resources required for the step.
    4. Re-schedule the action plan based upon your adjustments.

    The third issue – allocating the wrong resources – is harder to acknowledge or fix

    When we are talking about time, people and money, the wrong resource is usually the wrong person.  A tech task given to a less-tech savvy team member may get off track.  That’s because he or she has to learn the technology as the project progresses.  In some cases, the mismatch may be even worse.  You may be doing the equivalent of asking a fish to ride a bicycle.  A tenacious team member can become like a fish who insists that, he can ride that bicycle  That isn’t fair to the team member or your company.  While tenacity can be a valuable trait in an executive, self-awareness is also important here.

    The fourth issue you will likely see is the problem of external actors

    Your suppliers and customers, in particular, did not participate in your action planning and scheduling process.  They may have very different ideas about the timely completion of the tasks on your action plan.  Often it’s useful to sit down with the key players and discuss the desired schedule and the issues that affect timing.

    The final issue is sometimes a big problem

    Sometimes the urgent intrusion can be delegated.  If not, you must either delegate some or all of the action plan step or live with its postponement.  Sometimes completion of the action plan is inevitably delayed.

    Are you having any strategy execution problems?  If you’d like to discuss how we can help your strategic execution stay on track, consider holding a one-day workshop on Simplified Strategic Planning.

    In-house Workshop

    For more on execution, click here.

    Robert Bradford is President & CEO of the Center for Simplified Strategic Planning, Inc.  He can be reached at rbradford@cssp.com.

    M. Dana Baldwin is Senior Strategist with Center for Simplified Strategic Planning, Inc. He can be reached by email at: baldwin@cssp.com

    Co-Author, M. Dana Baldwin
    Robert Bradford
    Co-Author, Robert Bradford

  • Why is Commitment Crucial to Strategy?

    Commitment
    Commitment

    Why is commitment crucial and how does an organization get and keep it?

    Commitment means that senior management and key personnel throughout the company buy-in to driving the company forward to reach its  objectives.  Therefore, they have committed to the success of the company. Furthermore, they execute the strategies of the organization as effectively as possible.  Finally, their actions reflect the level of commitment they have and inspire those around them to excel.

    Why is it important to have commitment?

    In today’s competitive environment, it is essential for the organization to excel at developing and executing its strategies, mission, goals and objectives.  Anything less could allow openings for its competition to gain market share and hurt the performance of the company.

    There also are more human reasons for expecting commitment

    By having high expectations, and taking actions to reinforce them, the company reaffirms its commitment to each individual.  Also, setting high goals and having people achieve them is difficult unless there is a two-way commitment between the individual and the company.

    The individual needs to commit to doing well for the organization to succeed competitively

    The company needs to give its people the tools and backing needed so the individual succeeds in performing their role. First, where feasible, involve people in the decision-making processes of the company.  Many people have good ideas about how to improve things, or what new things could be done by the company.  Second, ask them for input and give them positive feedback, even when their idea is not currently appropriate for the company.

    How does an organization get commitment and, more importantly, keep it over time?

    First of all, give the individual the tools and authority needed to do their jobs effectively. Furthermore, give them the backing so that when they make a mistake, it becomes a learning opportunity, not a penalty.  Finally, establish a culture which reinforces commitment, not one that tears it down.  This starts at the very top of an organization, and can be one of the key factors in the overall success of the company.

    If your company is having trouble with commitment, a good place to start is by updating or building your strategic plan.

    We can help you create actionable strategies and build buy-in as you develop your strategic plan.  Attend the Simplified Strategic Planning Seminar to learn more about this and other aspects of Simplified Strategic Planning.

    Author, M. Dana Baldwin
    Author, M. Dana Baldwin

    M. Dana Baldwin is a Senior Consultant with Center for Simplified Strategic Planning, Inc. He can be reached by email at: baldwin@cssp.com

    For more about getting buy-in, read here.

  • Implementation Pitfalls

    Implementation pitfalls are common in strategic planning. But why is this – and what can we do about it?  We’ve noticed six very common issues that have hindered execution at companies we’ve worked with, and none of them is intractable.

    The most common implementation pitfalls are:

    1. Overcommitment
    2. Poorly defined objectives
    3. Poorly crafted implementation plans
    4. Hidden resistance
    5. Poor follow through
    6. Distraction

    Each of these causes a specific type of problem – and has a specific solution.

    Overcommitment

    Overcommitment is one of the most common implementation pitfalls in strategic planning.  This is because many options look beneficial and it is easier to accept all of them than to force a realistic prioritization of resources.  The problem is simply that no organization has the infinite resources required to pursue every good idea.  By pursuing too many objectives, you run the risk of moving ahead far too slowly with each.  Moving too slowly means you may only get halfway done with most of your objectives when you could complete a more realistic set of them.   In Simplified Strategic Planning, we recommend setting no more than 10 objectives – and, with many companies, we have suggested having even fewer.

    Poorly defined objectives

    Poorly defined objectives are the result of spending too little time on objective-setting – or trying to make everyone happy with vague objectives that are difficult to implement.  With poorly defined objectives, you end up unable to identify any but the vaguest actions needed to complete the task.  Well-defined objectives are absolutely necessary for good implementation.  We recommend setting objectives that are SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Results that are Timely).

    Poorly crafted implementation plans

    Poorly crafted implementation plans are similar, in that they are the result of short cuts in the process of creating the action plans.  When writing an action plan, you are both communicating with yourself (in the future) and allocating specific resources to the execution activities.  Failure to do these two steps with care and specificity usually results in missed targets and confusion.  To create better action plans, use the action planning process we prescribe in Simplified Strategic Planning.

    Hidden resistance

    Hidden resistance is a tough problem to spot before you encounter it.  Sometimes, members of your team will pretend to be on board with an objective but harbor some reservations about execution.  It is easy to sabotage an objective you don’t agree with by creating scheduling and resource conflicts.  To avoid this, use a strategic planning process that builds buy-in and agreement at every step – even if that means spending a little more time on your planning.

    Poor follow through

    Poor follow through is a problem that occurs when your execution activities are not routinely reviewed.  It’s just too easy to get off track when you don’t take time to assure you’re still following the path you carefully laid out.  We recommend holding monthly review sessions to examine progress on each action plan to assure the whole team is aware of what you’re doing – and what you are supposed to be doing.

    Distraction

    Distraction is the final common pitfall – and it’s a bad one.  Many executives (especially CEOs) are often distracted by the “flavor of the month”, or the last article they read that suggests good ideas.  The very thing that makes many executives successful also plays havoc with your strategic planning implementation.  To avoid this, stick to your plan.  Try to push as many new ideas into your annual strategic planning process as possible, with an understanding that the best ideas will certainly come out on top, given steady, persistent execution.  This doesn’t mean you should never snap up an opportunity that presents itself, but don’t let those opportunities take over your well-planned intentions.

    What pitfalls have you encountered in your implementation process.  Do you find implementation challenging?  Attend our next seminar on Simplified Strategic Planning to learn more about implementation and other aspects of strategic planning.

    For more on “Objectives – The What and The Why”, click here.

    Robert Bradford is President & CEO of the Center for Simplified Strategic Planning, Inc.  He can be reached at rbradford@cssp.com.

    Robert Bradford
    Author
    Robert W. Bradford

    © Copyright 2018 by Center for Simplified Strategic Planning, Inc., Ann Arbor, MI — Reprint permission

    Click here for more information on implementation.

    Click here for more information on execution and executability.

     

  • Strategic Management – Step Three: Monitoring the Process

    Monitoring the Process
    Monitoring the Process

    Monitoring the Process

    If you don’t know where you are going, you’ll probably wind up somewhere else.  Even with a clear implementation plan it’s possible to lose track of whether you are accomplishing your goal. For example, imagine the challenge faced by the engineers of the American transcontinental railroad. The strategic vision was that coast to coast rail transportation would unite the two halves of the country. The Central Pacific and the Union Pacific Railroad Companies began with the intention of meeting somewhere in the middle. They did ultimately succeed when the last spike was driven on May 10th, 1869 in Promontory Summit, Utah.

    The two companies were united by the same strategic vision, however, successful implementation was difficult and extremely complicated.  They actually did not agree upon their final meeting point and therefore passed each other by 200 miles. It took a resolution by both houses of Congress to determine the point at which they would meet. Literally, the two companies did not know where they were going – and consequently they wound up someplace else.

    During the period of time between annual strategic planning cycles, monitoring the process is a must

    The same holds true for each planning cycle.  Between planning sessions, the team leader must monitor completion of assignments.

    Progress on the objectives  is dependent upon following through on the resources committed.  Therefore, monthly review of the Action Plans, which drive strategic change, is critical for accomplishing the objectives.

    A quarterly review of their assumptions, strategies and implementation plans is also a must. This is how we keep the plan moving forward and adjust the course and direction if required.

    Tourist in New York City: How do I get to Carnegie Hall?
    New York Resident: Practice, practice, practice!

    Repeating the strategic planning process is one of the biggest levers for long term success. After completing your initial planning effort, your team will be enthusiastic about their new ability to shape their future. They will then be executing the action plans and monitoring the process for one year.

    Upon repeating the process the following year, they will naturally see ways to make the plan better. Perhaps they will realize that there were gaps in the market and competitive information. Their assumptions about the future will need to be modified. Additionally, they may find new elements to include in the process or new opportunities that deserve their attention and resources.

    Along with increased facility with the planning process,  your managers  will ask more insightful questions about your company’s future success

    They will downplay the “tactical noise” in the business environment and therefore focus more on the “strategic direction” of your enterprise. This skill will result in a richer and clearer strategic planning document.  Furthermore, it will carry through in your managers’ ability to prioritize both their short and long term decisions and activities. Thus leading to the team being more effective in executing the action plans and monitoring the process in the future.

    Just as piano performance improves with practice, your management team’s performance will improve with each iteration of the  process. Performance in this important cycle of business management just might yield a standing ovation at your next shareholder’s meeting.

    Monitoring Process – Quick Reference

    Note:  This is the fourth and final post in a series of posts from Tom Ambler’s article Strategic Management: 3 Steps to the Cycle of Success originally posted in Compass Points.  The first post introduced the series.  Read it here.  The second post discussed planning and gave a sports analogy.  Read it here.  The third post discussed implementation.  Read it here.  For a more complete understanding of strategic management, attend the Simplified Strategic Planning Seminar.

    Author, Tom Ambler
    Author, Tom Ambler

    © Copyright 2018 by Center for Simplified Strategic Planning, Inc., Ann Arbor, MI — Reprint permission granted with full attribution.

     

  • Aligning Employees with Strategy: Building Support for the Strategic Plan – Fifth Step

    In this post, we are discussing how buy-in helps align employees with strategy.  Buy-in is one of the key steps in strategic alignment.  Lets review how we get strategic alignment.  There are five basic steps that you must take to assure your employees are aligned with your company’s strategies.

    First, employees must have the conceptual tools required for good strategic thinking about their work.

    Second, employees must understand the strategy.

    Third, your organizational structure needs to be aligned with your strategy.

    Fourth, strategy must be reflected in the structure of individual jobs – especially those in critical areas.

    Fifth, you must have buy-in to the strategy.

    Five Steps to Alignment
    Buy-in for Alignment

    Let’s look at the Fifth of these requirements in more detail.

    Fifth item: buy-in.

    If you have an employee who thinks the strategy isn’t good, you won’t have alignment no matter what you do

    The first two items, tools and communication, will go a long way towards getting buy-in.  However, there are people who just won’t buy into some strategies – especially if they are smart. The techie salesperson in the new-user computer store may not buy into the strategy of targeting new users as a market. This makes sense, as the strategy doesn’t fit with the salesperson’s skill set.  But it will create problems for both the employee and the company.

    Often, this kind of buy-in problem arises as the result of a failure to fit the job design to the strategy. Occasionally, however, you will find some employees just don’t buy-in to the strategy. In a non-strategic position, you might overlook a lack of buy-in, but this can be a real problem in a strategic position.  It’s always useful to ask yourself if the lack of buy-in stems from a valid objection to the strategy.  If this is not the case, you – and your employee – will be best off parting ways as soon as possible. Such a basic strategic conflict won’t be good for either your company or the employee’s career. Even if the employee performs, not adhering to strategy will cause problems and conflicts which will hinder that person’s growth.

    Achieving buy-in is tough, because, unless people come up with the idea themselves, it’s hard for them to buy-in

    In addition, it’s hard to get people to buy into a strategy that might not be in their best interest. It is also difficult to get people to feel bought in to a strategy that doesn’t improve their job security. Getting people to buy into a strategy means, in part, you have to get them to believe in it. This means the strategy itself has to have some credibility with your employees. It’s easier to add credibility in a company that spends a little to make employees happier and make working conditions better.

    A difficult situation is a company that has a lot of employees at the lower end of the pay scale

    Input from these people is critical, and they have a important effect on the way your products or services are created, delivered and perceived. The fact that they aren’t making much money often means that they consider anything management says as suspect. It’s hard for these people to believe that management is on their side.  Ask yourself “Could we pay these people more?”  If you can’t pay more, perhaps you can offer a real and valuable substitute.  It’s easy to get people really excited about strategy if they participated in creating it. Also people may be very excited about your strategy if they understand and believe in the concepts involved.

    Buy-in is much easier if your employees participated in developing the strategy

    This is one of the reasons why we push for involvement in the strategic planning process for as many people as is practical. There are limits to what is practical.  It’s difficult to have effective, efficient strategic planning meetings when you have too many people as well as when you have too few people.  Find ways for people to contribute to the strategic decision-making process, even when they are not directly involved.

    Companies that take these few simple steps to build alignment find greater success

    You will find better support for implementation of your strategies and more effective day-to-day use of your strategies when you achieve alignment. This will make the difference between struggling to make your vision a reality and smoothly flowing into the future you have defined.

    Note:  This post is the fourth in a series of posts from Robert Bradford’s article Building Support for the Strategic Plan: Aligning Employees with Strategy originally posted in Compass Points in October 2001.  The first post introduced this series.  You can read it here.  The second post discussed the First and Second steps.  You can read it here.  The third post discussed the Third and Fourth steps.  You can read it here.

    How well do your employees buy into with your strategy?  Attend the Simplified Strategic Planning Seminar for more instruction on how to achieve buy-in as well as all other aspects of Simplified Strategic Planning.

    Robert Bradford
    Author
    Robert W. Bradford

    Robert Bradford is President & CEO of the Center for Simplified Strategic Planning, Inc.  He can be reached at rbradford@cssp.com.

    © Copyright 2018 by Center for Simplified Strategic Planning, Inc., Ann Arbor, MI — Reprint permission

  • Aligning Employees with Strategy: Building Support for the Strategic Plan – Third and Fourth Steps

    Aligning Employees with Strategy: Building Support for the Strategic Plan – Third and Fourth Steps

    In this post, we are discussing how organizational structure helps align employees with strategy.  Organizational structure is one of the key steps in strategic alignment.  Lets review how we get strategic alignment.  There are five basic steps that you must take to assure your employees are aligned with your company’s strategies.

    Robert Bradford
    Author
    Robert W. Bradford

    First, employees must have the conceptual tools required for good strategic thinking about their work.

    Second, employees must understand the strategy.

    Third, your organizational structure needs to be aligned with your strategy.

    Fourth, strategy must be reflected in the structure of individual jobs – especially those in critical areas.

    Fifth, you must have buy-in to the strategy.

    Five Steps to Alignment
    Aligning Employees with Strategy

    Let’s look at the Third and Fourth of these requirements in more detail.

    Organizational structure can greatly help or hinder strategic alignment

    Third, organizational structure can greatly help or hinder strategic alignment. There are several ways this can happen, but let’s look at one example. It’s very common in larger organizations to find a “silo effect”, where the organization is very effective vertically within a department or division, yet lacks efficiency and flexibility in activities which require cross-departmental cooperation. This effect will play in your favor if you create these “silos” around areas which may become separate strategic business units, but may present obstacles to integrating an acquired company, or tackling organization- wide strategic change in areas like quality or IT, which typically require cross-functional teams to succeed. Some very successful organizations, such as Hewlett-Packard, have taken this concept into account by creating “matrix” organizational structures. These structures attempt to break down “silo” walls by creating reporting structures by both operational function (i.e. manufacturing, accounting) and market or product (i.e. home office printers, banking industry).

    The way you hire, train, compensate and retain the employees you have in key strategic areas contributes to your employees’ strategic alignment

    The fourth item, job structure, is a pretty broad topic. It’s very important that the way you hire, train, compensate and retain the employees you have in key strategic areas works with your strategies. If you target commodity customers, for example, you definitely want all these things to reflect your commodity orientation. For example, in your hiring you want to be hiring people with an eye towards the fact that they might be driving costs up or down through their skills. Your commodity outlook is going to be reflected in one of two ways: either you want high-quality people who by virtue of their quality and productivity keep your costs down or you want cheap people who will keep your costs down simply because they cost less to pay. Any place where you are hiring smart expensive people, you want to be sure you can use the skills of those people to drive your costs down, otherwise all you’re doing is driving your cost up.

    On the other hand, if you have a specialty strategy, you definitely want to be looking for people who add value to your product or service, so smart expensive people in your company will need to add value commensurate with the cost of hiring them. At the same time, you may have ways to add value with inexpensive people and if you do, you need to manage them to think about the customer and the product or service the right way. This is especially important because inexpensive people may have difficulty understanding certain specialty marketplaces.

    In any case, you need to remember that you will be challenged by the cost of rejecting otherwise well-qualified job applicants who won’t fit with your strategy. A big challenge that companies face beyond this is the tendency to use specialty people in places where they should commodity ones – or vice versa. In a commodity company, this drives costs up, and the potential for added value is lost on the targeted commodity customers. In specialty companies, commodity people and commodity job structures drive value out, which will devalue your offering and drive specialty customers away. There is no question that matching employees and their jobs to strategy has a big payoff.

    Note:  This post is the third in a series of posts from Robert Bradford’s article Building Support for the Strategic Plan: Aligning Employees with Strategy originally posted in Compass Points in October 2001.  The first post introduced this series.  You can read it here.  The second post discussed the First and Second steps.  You can read it here.  The next post in this series will discuss the Fifth step and conclude the series.

    How well does your organizational structure align your employees with your strategy?  Attend the Simplified Strategic Planning Seminar for more instruction on how to improve your alignment as well as all other aspects of Simplified Strategic Planning.

    Robert Bradford is President & CEO of the Center for Simplified Strategic Planning, Inc.  He can be reached at rbradford@cssp.com.

    © Copyright 2018 by Center for Simplified Strategic Planning, Inc., Ann Arbor, MI — Reprint permission