How do leaders help others think and act strategically? part #2

When helping others to think and act strategically, make sure the senior team  has certain key characteristics in order to position the entire organization to be successful. As John Kotter noted years ago in his book, Leading Change, when building a change cycle, make sure you have the following as part of your key team, namely positional power, expertise, credibility, i.e. good reputations, and people with leadership experience. In particular, make sure this group of people have enough power to lead the change process and enough ability to communicate the new vision related to the change.

Every time I think about Kotter’s advice, I also think of Jim Collins and his distinction between executive power,, i.e. the power to make decisions based on your place in the table of organization, and legislative power, i.e. your ability to form a coalition of people to make something happen given you do not have enough positional power to change the current situation. It is the combination of both that needs to be part of the senior team. These are the folks who have the potential to make sure thinking strategically and acting strategically will take place within other groups within the company.

Yet, as I share this with you today, we need to remember the advice and counsel of Robert Sutton and Huggy Rao in their book, Scaling Up Excellence: Getting To More Without Settling For Less (Crown Business, 2014), who note that “Effective scaling depends on believing and living a shared mindset throughout your group, division, or organization. Scaling is analogous to a ground war rather than an air war because developing, spreading and updating a mindset requires repleteness vigilance. It requires stating the beliefs and living the behavior, and then doing so again and again.” From my experience, leaders who have ground level experience and credibility make a huge difference when it comes to strategic thinking and acting. 

This week, check to make sure your team has the right combination of characteristics to ensure that they and others will be successful in thinking and acting strategically.

Geery Howe, M.A. Consultant, Executive Coach, Trainer in Leadership, Strategic Planning and Organizational Change Morning Star Associates 319 - 643 - 2257