When you think of strategy implementation/execution, do you think that your industry is unique or different; therefore you cannot put your company and/or industry in the likes of others? I guarantee you that you do!
Questions:
- Why do we do what do?
- Aren’t all businesses the same regardless (vision, strategies, activities and people, process and finance)?
- How are we different from other businesses – like or not?
- We obviously know about the differences related to each companies culture and various innuendos of industry to industry, yet that is not the question we asked…. and we can go on and on about those…so…
Regardless of the size of your company, the industry, the location, the size, etc., we are all businesses and we all do the same things – we all have people, processes and finances. In addition, we all should have a defined Vision and Strategies – who and what we are and where to play and how to win – and then activities to accomplish the Vision and Strategies. Again, I guarantee that if I ask if you have this in place, know it, etc. the answer would fall flat.
It does not matter your industry, size, location, etc. What matters is that you address defining your strategies and executing upon them.
Numerous studies have noted the very weak relationship of strategy formulation to strategy execution. Fortune Magazine stated, “Less than 10% of strategies effectively formulated are effectively executed.” Companies large and small worldwide spend billions of dollars each year on strategy formulation. A search of the Web using Google™ took less than 1/3 of a second to return more than 1.3 million hits on strategy consulting, ranging from the “Big 6” firms to boutique firms specializing in strategy. Interestingly, a similar search for strategy implementation consulting returned less than 500,000 hits. Even allowing for overlap this is a significant disconnect.
If Fortune is correct, only one of ten companies that do an effective job of formulating strategy are doing equally effective jobs of implementing it. For the rest, presumably, the well-crafted strategy is lost in the press of day-to-day tactical concerns or is left to languish in a report on the CEO’s bookshelf.
Businesses today face change on all fronts – from economic, regulatory, competitive, customer, to access to resources. Consequently, every company is adjusting its strategy and that implies change. The success of your strategy depends on your people and technology to measure – will they be able to implement the strategy and achieve results.
As a leader your people look to you for guidance on what needs to be done, and how. What they need and seek:
- Set the strategy
- Communicate the strategy
- Implement the strategy through people
- Get results
The most difficult part is getting your people to implement the strategy, and mainly it is because they are not connected because you have not connected with and to them!
Although approximately 88% of large organizations engage in strategic planning, as reported by Bain & Company, a survey by McKinsey reports that only 45% are “satisfied” with their strategic plans. If only 45% are satisfied, that means that more than half are not satisfied. Of the 45% satisfied, how many are actually happy with their plan?
The industry is irrelevant, yet what is relevant is you. Meaning only you can take your company now acting like the Titanic, and turn it into the Space Shuttle. Real time, on going implementation and results is what matters.
What are you doing to make that happen?
What are you doing to make sure you are not one of the less fortunate statistics and one of the positive statistics?
What are you doing to implement and execute upon your strategies successfully?
Tell yourself and tell us!
