The need to formulate and then execute a preconceived plan is probably as old as humanity itself.
Even before the advent of modern civilization, human beings depended on their superior ability to organize into cooperative groups to achieve critical social goals, such as the acquisition of food or the creation of shelters.
But the earliest literature on how to plan and execute strategies seems to be tied to a different organized activity: warfare. Among the best-known texts is Sun Tzu’s The Art of War, which dates back to the fourth century B.C.
Successful CEOs understand the relationship between behaviors, strategy, and high performance…ensuring that culture is a source of competitive advantage, allowing it to be an enabler-rather than a hindrance-to strategy execution.
While many organizations are proficient at strategy formation, many of these same organizations get lost in the complex nature of effective strategy execution,
- Less than 10% of strategies effectively formulated are effectively executed,
- 85% of executive teams spend less than one hour per month discussing strategy,
- Only 5% of the workforce understands the company strategy,
- More than 2/3 of companies had targets that exceeded 9% real growth, yet less than 10% achieved this level of profitable growth,
- 60% of organizations don’t link budgets to strategy,
- 80% of enterprise strategies fail at execution stage,
In majority of the cases, 70% of real problem isn’t bad strategy…it’s bad execution,
The real enemy of execution is your day job!
It’s the enormous amount of energy that’s necessary just to keep your operation going on a day-to-day basis; and, unluckily, it’s also the thing that makes it so hard to execute anything new. The whirlwind robs from you the focus required to move your team forward.
Leaders rarely differentiate between the whirlwind and strategic goals because both are necessary to the survival of the organization. However, they are clearly different, and more important, they compete persistently for time, resources, energy, and attention.
We don’t have to tell you which will usually win this fight. The whirlwind is urgent and it acts on you and everyone working for you every minute of every day. The goals you’ve set for moving forward are important, but when urgency and importance clash, urgency will win every time.
Once you become aware of this struggle, you will see it playing out everywhere, in any team that is trying to execute anything new.
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