Into reality

Organisations are generally more than capable of setting strategic direction and creating strategic plans. The real challenge, however, is not so much in deciding what strategy to adopt, but how to make it live within the business.

We observe many of our clients developing strategy road maps, creating strategy teams and painstakingly holding communication forums with staff – all of which, in terms of management science is text book. And indeed, activities such as town hall meetings, if well executed, are valuable processes. But unless staff participate in the development of strategy or understand the implications of its execution the town hall meeting simply becomes an information-giving session and an opportunity missed.

Another observation in this arena is that strategy all-too-often gets hijacked by process, with the result that implementation can get forgotten. Over the last year we have seen many organisations struggle with over-complex systems and processes for setting strategy.
For our public sector clients, such processes are often driven by the need to link strategy with targets demanded by government or other external agencies. Where this is the case, transparency for people within the organisation becomes critical. With transparency must come involvement in the ‘how’ of execution or else the strategic intent simply withers on the vine.

In the private sector, we have seen strategy processes become over-complex and overwhelmed by a proliferation of PowerPoint slides and reports. Our experience is that the gap between intent and execution can only be addressed where the strategy comes alive through engagement, through team and individual performance contracts and through constant team reviews. The key appears to be in ‘socialising’ the strategy so that staff can understand what they are working in service of and can contribute ideas and momentum to the implementation of strategy.