Preparing For The Future In The Middle Of A Pandemic - #3

During the last 60 days, many leaders have been talking with me about strategic planning. They are recognizing that their current plans need to be significantly overhauled given recent events and future possibilities. Having worked so hard to create their current plans, they are now feeling overwhelmed about how to recreate them. To assist them in this process, I have had to review some key concepts.

First, to plan for the future in the middle of a complex environment like COVID-19 and a total economic free fall, one needs to go back to the beginning and understand what is strategy. In its most simplest form, strategy is three things. For starts, strategy is an extensively premeditated, carefully built, long term plan designed to achieve a particular goal. However, at the exact same time, this long term plan needs to be adaptable by nature due to unforeseen variables rather than presenting a rigid set of instructions or tactics which has the potential to create organizational vulnerability. Finally, strategy needs to serve as an important function in promoting ongoing evolutionary success.

What most leaders forget in the middle of complexity is that strategy needs to be planned, adaptable and evolutionary. And that is hard combination to create within a plan.

Therefore, I have been encouraging more and more leaders right now to not create a new 2-3 year strategic plan because there are just too many unforeseen variables and unpredictable outcomes that are surfacing and will surface over the coming 9-12 months. Instead, I have strongly encouraged them to build a shorter, bridge plan which focuses on the next 6-9 months. 

The goal of a bridge plan is to create maximum adaptability and to continue moving forward strategically where possible. In times like these, the organization needs to survive, and on the other side of this global pandemic, the organization needs to be well positioned to thrive in the aftermath. Thus, a leader needs to focus on the core business, protect cash flow, and understand what your employees and your customers are going through at this time period, because on the other side of this global pandemic you want to have the capacity to execute efficiently and effectively in the new environment.

For many people in leadership positions, the hard part about building and executing a bridge plan is that it seems simplistic. There will be goals and objectives, metrics and dates with names for who is responsible for what but the overall bridge plan might not have too many goals or too many objectives. 

At times like this, I have to point out that the simplicity of a bridge plan is the source of its strength. Recognizing that during times of high complexity, we need to remember that most people are just trying to figure out how to survive and get a couple of things done on a day to day basis. Their bandwidth is low and their stress is high. Therefore, a highly adaptable bridge plan gives them focus without overwhelming intensity and employee burnout. In short, it helps them feel like they are making progress and gives them the capacity to prioritize when all things before them are feeling like they are both urgent and important.

The other thing a bridge plan does is that it gives people in senior leadership positions the opportunity to zoom out and understand how the big picture is changing. And once they have zoomed out, then they can better assess the risk profile before the company, and determine if new conditions or unforeseen variables have surfaced which would call into question the current bridge plan. 

With such a high degree of complexity and numerous adaptive challenges continuing to surface on a regular basis, maximum flexibility, which is what a bridge plan gives senior leaders, allows them the ability to adapt the plan, better mobilize key people and resources, and then focus on the execution of the plan so that it delivers results at the operational and, when possible, strategic levels. 

With the above mind, I encourage you start thinking about how to build a bridge plan and who needs to be involved in the process. I also encourage you to build a bridge plan that is short, adaptable and gives you and the company maximum flexibility. Then, as the next 90-120 days unfold before us all, you will be able to make sure your team is getting the right things done at the right time in midst of these difficult times.

For those of you who want to be better prepared for the future, I encourage you to read the following two books:

- Charan, Ram. Leadership in the Era of Economic Uncertainty: The New Rules for Getting the Right Things Done in Difficult Times, McGraw Hill, 2009.

- Weick, Karl E., and Kathleen M. Sutcliffe. Managing The Unexpected: Resilient Performance in an Age of Uncertainty. John Wiley & Sons, Inc, 2007.

They will give you the language, perspective and frame work for doing this level of work.

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

How do effective leaders plan when the future is so wildly unpredictable? - part #1

Not too long ago, before COVID-19 took off, we met for lunch. When he sat down, he just looked exhausted. He was a good and experienced leader, but he was way past his edges. 

He started our visit by saying, “I don’t even know where to begin. I can barely keep up with the pace and all the messiness around this change we are going through.”

The company was going through a major restructuring to meet new market expectations. This included many old and new people moving into new jobs plus lots of systems being changed. Along with all of the positional changes, this particular leader was working with new teams and new expectations, more complicated metrics, more diverse primary and secondary customers, plus more unknowns than knowns overall.

As we visited, he realized that he and his teams were going to have to expect more “surprises” and uncertainty. They were at the beginning of the change cycle rather than at the end.

After listening and getting a sense of the big picture, my two initial thoughts were the following. First, as the Irish poet David White has pointed out, “Our language is not large enough for the territory in we have entered.” We are struggling to find the words to describe what is happening within and outside ourselves, our organizations and our teams. Some of the old words just don’t capture what is happening without significant “unpacking” or sharing.

Second, John Paul Lederach wrote in his book, The Moral Imagination: The Art and Soul of Building Peace (Oxford University Press, 2005): “Centuries ago the apostle Paul described our world as a community wracked with unrelenting pain. “The whole creation grows,” he wrote, “with labor pains until now.” (Romans 8:22) The metaphor suggests that humanity lives in a time of great pain and great potential. Birth is simultaneously pain and potential, the arriving of that which could be but is not yet. I believe the human community still groans with pain today. We seek a birth of something new, a creation that can break us out of the expected. We seek the creative act of the unexpected.” The challenge of this “creative act of the unexpected” is that it can be overwhelming, draining and lonely when one is the leader.

When I step back and look at the big picture across multiple companies and multiple industries, I notice the rise of some interesting trends. First, a lot of re-planning is happening right now. Many leaders feel that their organizations are in a period of crisis and they desperately do not want this to damage them permanently.

Furthermore, many leaders are struggling with disjointed incrementalism, i.e. they know where they want to go, but are not sure exactly how to get there. The result is that they are perplexed but not confused. They worry about the uncertainties and difficulties of this time period, but they are not confused about what is most important. 

Next, many leaders are worried about a long term growth stall-out, i.e. a continued drop in revenue, growth or both that could happen over an extended period of time. They understand that the growth engine that powered the company to success has stopped working right now, but are unsure if it is no longer viable in the long term. They are also recognize that the real problem could be that the business environment is too complex and that bureaucracy is slowing everything down.

The outcome of the above is that many leaders are guiding their companies through a planning and action process which results in preventing problems before they become bigger problems, especially the problems that could define the future in a permanent manner. To a degree, everyone and everything feels like we are in state of permanent crisis.

With this in mind, we need to remember that leaders working through a crisis understand that a crisis has two distinct phases. The first is that emergency phase, where your task as a leader is to stabilize the situation and buy time for the team and the company. The second phase is the adaptive phase. Here, you tackle the underlying causes of the crisis and build capacity to thrive in a new reality. The adaptive phases is especially tricky, notes Ron Heifetz, Alexander Glasgow, and Marty Linsky in their article called “Leadership in a (Permanent) Crisis” (Harvard Business Review, July-August 2009), because “people put enormous pressure on you as the leader to respond to their anxieties with authoritative certainty, even if doing so means overselling what you know and discounting what you don’t.”

The above authors remind us that leaders “face two competing demands. They must execute in order to meet today’s challenges. And they must adapt what and how things get done in order to thrive in tomorrow’s world.” As they continue, “You need to confront loyalty to legacy practices and understand that your desire to change them makes you a target of attack…. As you consider eliminating practices that seem ill suited to a changing environment, you must distinguish the essential from the expendable…. What is so precious and central to an organization’s identity and capacity that it must be preserved?” In short, the authors explain that “… the dual goal of adaptive leadership: tackling the current challenge and building adaptability.”

Our challenge as leaders is that when we grasp this perspective, we have a problem which few talk about but many know. As Jim Mattis and Bing West write in their excellent book, Call Sign Chaos: Learning To Lead (Random House, 2019): “Business management books often stress centralized planning and decentralized execution. That is too top-down for my taste. I believe in a centralized vision, coupled with decentralized planning and execution.” To have the capacity to create a centralized vision and then live with decentralized planning and execution is not easy for most leaders. It goes against so much of what they have learned and experienced.

So, given all of the above, I have a question for all of you this week: Where do you get your good and/or new ideas from as you plan for the future? From my experience, I see the best leaders generate them after visiting with a wide network of diverse people and diverse resources. This week I encourage you to seek out a broader network of people and to engage in good in-depth exploration and sharing. It will help you see the bigger picture, generate a centralized vision and over time give you the capacity to work with decentralized planning and execution.

P.S. If you are hungry for some fresh perspective and interesting new ways of thinking, I encourage you to consider reading the following short, but good book: Kleon, Austin. Steal Like An Artist: 10 Things Nobody Told You About Being Creative, Workman Publishing, 2012. It will get you thinking. 

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

Observations From A Home Office In The Midst Of A Pandemic

Given how rapidly current events have been unfolding, it is hard to step back and look at the bigger picture. Right now, many of us have been sucked into a state of hyper-vigilance and reactive paranoia. Every bit of new information indicates another possible worst case scenario. And leaders at all levels are desperately focused on reducing these uncontrollable risks to a manageable level of chaos.  

Nevertheless, there will come a time period in the future when all of this will be a story told to children and grandchildren. As in the past, some generations talk about where they were when JFK was assassinated or when Nixon resigned. Other generations talk about where they were on 9/11. For those living at this time period, COVID-19 will be a similar defining event and experience. 

Still, for those of us who are in the midst of it on a day to day basis, there are significant short and long term impacts. As one who is visiting regularly with a large and diverse collection of people in leadership positions, I would like to share five observations about what is happening. 

First, with every one moving out of the corporate office and working from home, we have now entered into a world where all sorts of new problems are starting to surface. I recognize that not all homes and not all families are set up for a home office. One of the big problems happening right now is that our homes are our homes, our home office and now our local school, given that schools, colleges and universities have all closed for an indefinite time period. 

Traditionally, these three things are not all happening in the same space. Now we are employees, teachers, and parents all in the same physical place. The impact of this is a pressure cooker for all involved. Add to this mix, someone being in a leadership position, who has to coordinate and communicate with others in multiple home offices, and everyone’s stress levels is rising to unprecedented heights. In short, there is the potential for multiple nuclear melt downs each day.

At the same time, there are no boundaries between work, family life and school’s expectations about learning, especially given current technology and limited physical space in many homes. While this is not new on one level, now that everyone is crammed into the same space for an indefinite time period, and, if they are actually practicing social distancing, then there are limited resources to help cope with the pressures. 

For me, I struggle with the term social distancing because in reality what is needed is physical distancing not social distancing. While many are practicing social distancing, what has happened is that they have inadvertently limited their social support and they have not been able to utilize their normal stress management systems, e.g. the gym, seeing friends, church, etc.. The result is short tempered people crammed into spaces not designed for what is expected to happen within them. 

Therefore, quoting an old Gibran saying, there needs to be “space in our togetherness”. For starts, we need to maintain boundaries between when we are working at home and when we are a family at home. We need to practice not talking about work during family time so we can relax together and just be a family. We also need to go outside for a walk, when possible, so we can unwind from the pressure cooker of being in the same space at the same time. This may require us to be creative, but it is doable if we plan accordingly.

Second, when we all worked in an office on a day to day basis, some days things went well and other days we struggled. Still, most people could make progress and could connect with their boss and co-workers to solve problems. When we shifted to everyone working from home, many are struggling with how exactly to do teamwork.

Most offices utilize an analog form of teamwork. With daily face to face communications, leaders role modeled key behaviors before, during and after teamwork. These leadership behaviors were a mix of social and technical skills. These analog teams generated success through mutual trust, shared values, and a clearly defined sense of mission or purpose. To make this happen, leaders and the team had to show a lot of self-discipline and a high degree of self and group awareness.

However, with everyone working from home, we now enter into a different model of teamwork, i.e. a 4-D team. A 4-D team is defined as a group of people who are primarily connected through a digital platform and are dispersed, diverse and dynamic, namely they routinely go through frequent membership changes. As a result, 4-D teams are more global, virtual and project-driven. They often struggle because they have limited face time and are dependent on digital communication, which prevents the ability to understand nonverbal and contextual clues that often provide insight into what is going on. Furthermore, the lack of in-person meetings also removes the ability for understanding individual and collective moods of the group.

With everyone working from home in order to reduce exposure or transmission of COVID-19, team members are tending to be more consultation or coordination focused rather than typical office based, teamwork focused. As leaders, we have to understand that 4-D teams generate success through transparent performance measures, i.e. everyone being able to see the dash board results. Finally, successful 4-D teams need to know what is expected of them, how performance is measured, and why it all matters.

From my vantage place, I completely understand why everyone has moved home, but I think the challenge is that we are not assisting people in leadership positions to switch from analog based leadership choices to 4-D leadership choices. For those of you who want to be better 4-D leaders at this time period, I encourage you to read the following article: Haas, Martine and Mark Mortensen. “The Secrets of Great Teamwork.” Harvard Business Review, June 2016. The long term impact of a more virtually connected workforce is going to require people to switch how they engage in teamwork. We can make this shift but it is going to challenge all involved.

Third, we need to talk about strategic planning and strategic plans. During a normal winter into spring time period, I routinely teach multiple groups about strategic planning. One of the things I point out is that every strategic plan has a strategic decay rate, i.e. all the information that influenced people who created the plan will, over time, become obsolete. Ultimately, a strategic plan will no longer be functional because the environment within which the plan is being executed has so fundamentally shifted from what people thought was going to take place due to unforeseen variables.

Having been involved in numerous strategic planning meetings in 2018 and 2019, and having read multiple SWOT documents and PESTAL analysis documents as part of these planning processes, I can assure all of you that no one had a pandemic or COVID-19 level event on their radar screen. For large and small companies, this a black swan event, namely something that is so far outside the norm of possibilities that they are completely overwhelmed strategically and operationally.

So, here we are at the end of the first quarter of 2020, and all of this year’s strategic plans are highly dysfunctional. The organization’s strategic intent, e.g. to grow into multiple markets with multiple products and services, may still be the desire, but how we are going to execute this will have to change during the next 12-18 months given the huge amount of day to day technical problems and rampant and unforeseeable adaptive challenges that keep surfacing.

Therefore, I believe two things will take place this summer. First, there will be a lot of strategic re-planning which will include some major SWOT analysis work. Some companies may choose to create 6-9 month strategic bridge plans instead of normal 3-5 year plans so that they can see how things settle out economically. 

Simultaneously, there are going to be some intense After Action Reports created to make sure the lessons learned from the first and second quarter of 2020 are not lost and not repeated during future challenges of this magnitude. If past is prologue, many senior leaders will be extremely focused and diligent in this level of work. In short, everyone is going to be way more prepared moving forward.

Fourth, we need to understand the importance of proactive re-recruitment and retention in the midst of this pandemic. If you entered this time period on a dysfunctional team, more likely it has become more dysfunctional. If you entered this time period on a highly functional team, it just got better because of the focus and the urgency of getting things done together.

Our challenge as leaders is to recognize that many key people are putting in a lot extra effort and attention to make sure things run smoothly. We need to notice these actions, praise them, and assure them that all they are doing is not going unnoticed. Good people respond well to this kind of support and ultimately they will want to stay with the company.

But if an A player is working on a poor team and the team has gotten worse, then they will start looking for a new job. The frustrating thing is that a solid A player who is not re-recruited and encouraged to stay will be long gone before certain leaders even knew there was a problem. Therefore, I am encouraging all leaders to reach out to their people on a one to one basis. Now is the time to talk to them, to listen to them, and to reassure them that they are an important member of the team. During the next 6-9 months, we can not afford to loose key people who are making a major difference, operationally and strategically.

Finally, we need to understand that before COVID19 showed up many companies and their employees were working very hard to meet their goals and the needs of their customers. Folks reported to me at the beginning of this new year that they were busy, focused and feeling the pressure to serve their customers better and better.

When COVID-19 showed up, people were already feeling pushed. Now they just feel overwhelmed. What was once a future focused level of busyness has now shifted into a period of instability, reactivity, and general frustration and confusion. Everyone is on edge about what will happen next. In short, people are doing more work and wondering if any of it is actually making a difference.

While this is normal in a crisis of this magnitude, one thing is lost, namely deep work. Cal Newport in his book, Deep Work: Rules For Focused Success In A Distracted World (Grand Central Publishing, 2016) defines deep work as “professional activities performed in a state of distraction-free concentration that push your cognitive capabilities to their limit.” With so much incoming information and reactive problem solving, more and more leaders are not able to practice deep work.

When leaders choose to make the time for deep work, it gives them and their organization the ability to quickly master complex situations, make better decisions, and solve problem more effectively. Therefore, I am encouraging more leaders to turn off the news, step away from constant inputs like e-mail and various digital meetings, and instead spend a set period of time on a regular basis concentrating on what needs to happen in the short term and the long term for their business to be successful. During these periods of reflection, they need to look for the patterns within all of the information and notice how key people and teams are doing, especially in the areas of teamwork, communication and problem solving. In simple terms, leaders need uninterrupted time to sift through all the data and find the useful information. 

As we know, crisis leadership has two distinct phases. The first is the emergency phase when your task as a leader is to stabilize the situation and buy time. The second is the adaptive phase, when you tackle the underlying causes of the crisis and build the capacity to thrive in a new reality. For those of you who want to understand these two phases better and to be well prepared for the second phase, I encourage you to read the following article during your next deep work session: Heifetz, Ronald, Alexander Glasgow, and Marty Linsky. “Leadership in a (Permanent) Crisis”, Harvard Business Review, July-August 2009. In sum, deep work gives us the capacity to distinguish between what is essential in the short term and what it vital to long term success.

We are living through a time period this spring where more and more people feel a deep level of discouragement, loneliness, and frustration. All around us the world has become a messy place filled with confusion and contradictions. And we struggle to find a sense of hope and shared humanity. Trust, love and compassion seem in short supply.

Still as I sit here this morning, I know one thing. We must be the change we wish to see in the world, referencing the old Gandhi quote. I need to role model thoughtfulness, compassion and a loving heart. I need to not let fear, vulnerability, and hopelessness define my world view. I need to reach out to my family, friends, co-workers and the rest of humanity on a regular basis and let them know that I treasure their presence in my life, and that they are important to me in the midst of these challenging times. Finally, I must be kind to myself, and remember that each new day I have a choice of how I am going to act and how I will treat others. And in the end, that is all that matters.  

So, stay healthy, stay safe, keep in touch, and I look forward to seeing you on the other side of this most unique time period.

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

The goal of the plan is to have it be owned and understood by those who have to execute it; the goal is not just to get it done.

When a senior team comes to the realization that the organization needs a new strategic plan, it is “all hands on deck.” Meetings are organized. Charts and graphs are created. People go into a frenzy of goal setting. Metrics abound. There is a rush to create the document so that the really important work of execution can take place. 

Some times, a strategic planning consultant is brought in to make it go faster and to be better organized. If that person is me, one of the first things I do is to stop the entire goal setting madness and slow things down. I remind people that the purpose of strategic planning is way more than creating a document in record time so that everyone can get it done in even faster time period.

Instead, I point out that the purpose of strategic planning is to create a process and a document where by the people who will do the work own it and understand why this is the best plan given the challenges before the organization and their industry. When people understand the WHY behind the plan and feel like they had a voice in creating it, then, when it is time to execute the plan, the plan is framed up as “our plan” rather than senior management’s plan.

When we create a process that results in clarity, commitment and ownership, then we have created something that is amazingly powerful, namely the desire to want to execute the plan. This is the secret to creating a strategic mindset which will be the foundation for creating multiple strategic plans over time.

This week focus on the process of building ownership and understanding. It will make a world of difference.

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

Self-care is not optional in the world of leadership.

Regularly now, people are discussing with me their strategic goals and plans for 2020 and 2021. Some are even willing to explore all the way out to 2022. They all recognize that this level of thinking is complicated and complex. For many, it is an in-depth exercise into thinking through a variety of scenarios and possible problems before they actually become problems.

And in the midst of this big picture thinking, I am the one who asks a different question: If it all works out according to your best thinking, there is a phenomenal amount of work to be done. So, what are you going to do as a leader so you don’t burn-out? 

High amounts of stress comes with aggressive strategic growth and change. Burn-out is common and very difficult to recover from. Self-care is not optional if you want to be successful over time.

Many leaders have thought through all the details related to goals and objectives, leading and lagging metrics, systems’ improvements and changes, reorganizations at the structural level and the need for cultural continuity. However, many have not through how to cope with the volume and complexity of the work. 

The upshot is that many leaders will do whatever it takes to “win” at work. Yet, most have not thought through the costs to them personally. They will make it happen at work and start loosing more and more at home. Their marriages begin to crumble due to lack of care. Their friendships with others outside the family start to vanish because there is little time for being a friend. Their children start to feel like they are a burden or just one more project being managed. 

And finally, the health and well being of these leaders starts to suffer, too. With lack of exercise and continued poor eating, their health becomes a roller coaster of stress induced illnesses and symptoms. Finally, it all implodes and becomes one big mess on so many different levels.

That is why the question, “what are you going to do as a leader so you don’t burn-out?”, is such an important question. Before life goes to pieces, it is time to sit down, to define some boundaries around work, and to figure out what is a reasonable and realistic self-care plan. Good health, physically, mentally, socially and spiritually, is not optional if you want to be an excellent leader during challenging times.

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

The Three Definitions of Strategy

After the morning strategic update by the CEO, I was sitting at a table over lunch with a mix of senior executives and middle managers when she turned to me in between bites and asked the following question: “So, how do I think strategically on a daily basis?”

It was a good question. I responded by saying: “It all depends on how you define the word “strategy.”

When I teach the From Vision to Action Leadership Training, I continually point out to all involved that the word strategy is a big word. Often used and rarely understood, most executive choose only one definition of it and instantly cause themselves and others many problems.

So, let’s dive into the first definition. Strategy is an extensively premeditated, carefully built, long term plan designed to achieve a particular goal. People like this definition because it is precise, focused and will generate an outcome. At the end of the day, we can say “we did it” and have a party.

However, the best leaders know that there is more to strategy. Every strategic commitment has a decay rate. This is the recognition that from the time it took to create the initial ideas for the plan to the moment the strategic plan is ready for sharing, all of our best thinking and analysis goes into the document. But, once the document is printed, everyone wants to “get it done.”  What they miss in their understanding of strategy is that it has to be adaptable by nature due to unforeseen variables not considered during the planning stage rather than a rigid set of instructions or tactics. Without the recognition of the strategic decay rate, strategy has the potential to create organizational vulnerability.

The third definition of strategy recognizes that to create strategy can be as simple as one to three people sitting around a table writing stuff down. “So, what do you want to get done during the next 1-3 years?” asks one person to another. “Here is my list,” says the first to the second. And the third person is madly writing it all down on a flip chart or typing it up. In the end, strategy is created, but not owned and understood by those who have to execute the plan.  What most leaders fail to recognize is that successful strategy serves an important function in promoting ongoing evolutionary success. Strategy is not a one time affair but an on-going and in-depth process of creating clarity, ownership, and focus over time.  

In short, strategy is a an extensively premeditated, carefully built, long term plan designed to achieve a particular goal. But for successful leaders, it is much more than a document created on an annual basis. It is a commitment to thinking deeply and more holistically. And this is what separates the great strategy from the good strategy.

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

What You Feed, Grows

It was a hot summer day as the senior team and I gathered for another meeting in the strategic planning process. As we walked into the corporate board room, the CEO took me aside and said, “I’d liked to make some opening remarks. You don’t mind do you?”

My response was “No. This is your team and your planning process. Feel free to set the tone for the meeting.”

Once we all were seated, the CEO started the meeting with a passionate call to arms. As he explained, “We are getting sucked into operations, systems and problems at the micro level. We are so focused on fixing everything that we have forgotten the customer. We are not concerned about their service experience as much as we are concerned about our own welfare. We need to stop focusing so much on fixing everything and instead ask ourselves the most important question of all, namely ‘What kind of organization do we want to become in 2-3 years?’  If we do not answer this question, then we will have everything fixed but, alas, have no customers. It is time to stop letting the tactics trump the strategic.”

I smiled as his words came pouring out. I agreed 100% with his analysis. In this organization, operational leadership was trumping strategic leadership. Furthermore, an operational focus at the senior team level was trumping strategic thinking and action by the top people. They were, in essence suffering from strategic blindness.

This has become a common problem in many organizations recently. Complexity is creating strategic blindness, i.e. the leaders within the organization do not see their strategy as a whole organization. They see bits and pieces of the strategy as it relates to them, but they do not comprehend it as whole. 

Furthermore, another problem continues to take place. Some leaders think that having a strategy is the same as executing a strategic plan. When people in leadership positions look at the parts and do not see “the whole”, the result is fragmentation and a general disorientation amongst all employees. When leaders think having a strategy is executing a strategy, there is a complete break down within the organization’s ability to synchronize it’s action and deliver a unified course of action.

When I encounter these kinds of problems, I always ask The Core Four Questions, namely “Who will lead?”, “Where is the vision and who has it?”, “What pace do you want to go?”, and “What should not be lost during the journey?”. The answers to these questions will point out whether or not the organization is caught in a pattern of institutional decline as described in Jim Collins’ book, How The Mighty Fall and Why Some Companies Never Give In, HarperCollins, 2009. They also will determine the path to recovery.

Once I have explored The Core Four Questions, I often have to instruct or coach those involved to utilize The Core Four Actions.  They are as follows:

- What you feed, grows.

- What you envision, guides.

- What you steward, endures.

- What you provide, activates and energizes.

The first of The Core Four Actions is “What you feed, grows.”  Based on my early adventures when I first moved to Iowa many decades ago, this phrase is a popular one amongst those I have worked with over the years. The challenge is that many people focus on the word “grow” but do not comprehend the key word “feed”.  When we turn to the dictionary for clarity, we learn that the word “feed” is defined by the following definitions: to give food to, to give as food, to furnish something essential to the development, sustenance, maintenance, or operation of, and to become nourished. 

When we take these definitions and think of them as leaders, we learn some important information. The first definition states “to give food to.” Here, executives need to build capacity, collaboration and commitment. They can do this by re-recruiting their best people and recruiting new people who are already in alignment with the new strategy and have a track record of implementing successful organizational change. 

In a time period where worry abounds, anxiety rises, and instability reigns, people are more divided than united. Employees everywhere are looking for clarity, order and direction. Clear and consistent information about what is happening and where we are going is vital. The key for leaders who are planning for change is to communicate more to their people rather than less.

Second, when we follow the “What you feed, grows” line of action, then we need to give as food things that build awareness and understanding. At this time period, we need to over-communicate a tremendous amount of historical perspective so people understand what is happening now, but also why it is happening. The present is a complete reflection of strategic choices made five to seven years ago. In essence, we are who we are by the choices we make and the path we have chosen to get to those choices.

At the same time, the best leaders understand that exceptional companies do not loose touch with the customer and their shareholders. When we provide constant support and a well defined and executable strategy, we have the potential to shape cultural values and standards, align culture and strategy, and define what is and what is not important within the organization. We also define what needs to be monitored and understood outside the organization. In short, when confronted with complexity, we need to not loose focus on the whole.

This week, sit down by yourself and ask the most important question: “What am I feeding in my organization? Fear or clarity? Focus or control? Second, sit down with your team and help them regain perspective and see the whole picture.  Review with them what has happened in the past that has lead you and the organization to this point. Then, help them see how your current strategy is positioning the company for the future. If we seek to overcome strategic blindness, then we must feed strategic clarity. Growth is then the outcome.

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

Thinking About The Past; Planning For The Future

The first quarter of 2015 is nearly in the history books and a new round of planning has started. In small and large group meetings, people are coming together to discuss summer goals and how they can position the organization for a strong finish in 2015 and a good beginning in 2016. Goals and objectives are being written and rewritten. People are studying metrics and talking about alignment. Supervision and coaching are kicking into high gear.

As one who is well aware of all this effort, I am continually reminded of the following quote by Jon Madonna, retired Chairman and CEO of KPMG International: “Nothing stops an organization faster than people who believe that the way they worked yesterday is the best way to work tomorrow. To succeed, not only do your people have to change the way they act, they’ve got to change the way they think about the past.” 

Our challenge as leaders is to create a sense of urgency and clarity that maintaining status quo is more dangerous than moving forward to a whole new level of performance. When all involved comprehend that what got us to here, may not get us to the new desired outcome we seek in the future, then there will become a new level of focus and determination.

This week I encourage you to do a better job of selling the problems and clarifying the vision for the future. The combination of the two will create a solid forward momentum.

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

Planning For The Future

Right now, a lot of people are planning for the future. Meetings are happening. Committees are being formed. Task forces are being assembled.  Everyone has a sense of how the rest of this year is going to play out so they have started focusing on 2015 - 2020 with great interest.

For many people in leadership positions, this whole planning thing is a two step process, namely plan and then implement.  While I wish it could be true, successful planning and successful implementation is a multi-step process with a great deal complexity.

For us here today, let’s realize that planning for the future is a six step process. The first step is to prepare for planning. Here we personally sense and identify problems within the organization. Next, we figure out how to frame them up so we can clearly work on them in the next stage. We also mobilize people, i.e. coalition building, around these issues and get them to work as a team so they will be ready for the next stage of planning.

During the second step, we need to help all involve understand the purpose of the planning process and the plan. For example, they need to understand the planning road map, i.e. how many meetings and what is the goal of each meeting etc.  At this stage, we create the actual plan with all of it’s specific goals and objectives.

In the third step, we prepare for implementation of the plan. Now, all involved need to understand how to communicate the plan so there is wide spread ownership of it rather than defaulting to the normal “get’er done”mentality.

In the fourth step, we roll-out the plan and begin to implement it. Here, we need to focus on short term wins so people have greater confidence in the planning and the plan over time.

In the fifth step, everyone will be executing the plan. The key to success is to make sure we are using metrics to measure our progress.  Over time, the metrics help the changes to become standard operating procedure.

Finally, in the sixth step, we need to routinely pause for dialogue, evaluation, and review. It is important that we step back from what we are doing and check to make sure the assumptions and decisions we made back in step one and step two were the correct ones. This is not a time to just hold hands and sing “cum by ya”. It is a time for reflection and accountability. 

During the next 30 days, be more mindful of the above different steps to the planning process. Make sure the one you are participating in is well organized and purposeful. Over time, it will make a world of difference throughout the organization.

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

Recommended Readings

In the January-February 2014 issue of the Harvard Business Review, I found numerous articles worth reading.

First, I encourage those interested to read “What VUCA Really Means for You” by Nathan Bennett and G. James Lemoine. A two paragraph article with a dynamic diagram explaining how to prepare and think about working in a VUCA, i.e. volatile, uncertain, complex and ambiguous, environment.  For those executives thinking about 2018 and 2020, this is a great little article to read before communicating about the future. The diagram alone is worth the effort. Here is a link: http://hbr.org/2014/01/what-vuca-really-means-for-you/ar/1

Second, I thoroughly enjoyed reading “Building a Game-Changing Talent Strategy” by Douglas A. Ready, Linda A. Hill and Robert Thomas. Based on their research of BlackRock, the Tata Group and Envision, the authors found that these “three companies  demonstrate the essential attributes of a game-changing organization: They are driven by purpose, oriented toward performance, and guided by principles.”  However, in the process of conducting interviews with these three companies, the authors discovered a “fourth thread that weaves them even more tightly together: Each is supported by a game-changing talent strategy.” As they write, “those talent strategies balance four inherent tensions: They support both strategic and operational superiority; they are globally scaled yet locally relevant; they foster a collective culture yet enable high potentials to thrive as individuals; and their policies endure yet are agile and open to revitalization.” For those in the financial services industry in particular, this is a must read for 2014.  Others will find the content helpful and thought-provoking. Here is the link: http://hbr.org/2014/01/building-a-game-changing-talent-strategy/ar/1

Third, I was delighted to read “The Big Lie of Strategic Planning” by Roger L. Martin, who is the coauthor with A.G. Lafley of Playing to Win: How Strategy Really Works (Harvard Busines sReview Press, 2013). This is a must-read article for all who are doing or planning to do strategic planning.  As he points out, “In an effort to get a handle on strategy, managers spend thousands of hours drawing up detailed plans that project revenue into the future. These plans may make managers feel good, but all too often they matter very little to performance.” What we as executives and leaders often forget is that “strategy making is uncomfortable; it’s about taking risks and facing the unknown. Unsurprisingly, managers try to turn it into a comfortable set of activities.” As I noted in this blog yesterday, the current result is a turn toward modest aspirations.  To help leaders reconcile with feeling uncomfortable during strategic planning, Martin recommends the following:

- “Keep it simple. Capture your strategy in a one-pager that addresses where you will play and how you will win.”

- “Don’t look for perfection. Strategy isn’t about finding answers. It’s about placing bets and shortening the odds.”

- “ Make the logic explicit. Be clear about what must change for you to achieve your strategic goal.”

A wonderful article and another great read for every senior team thinking about the future.  Here is the link: http://hbr.org/2014/01/the-big-lie-of-strategic-planning/ar/1

Happy reading!

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

The Temptation of Modest Aspirations

Routinely now, more and more companies are struggling as they plan for the future. People are sitting in meetings talking about where they want to be in 2018 and 2020. They are eager to be the best in their field and for everyone in the company to be passionate and unified in delivering this mission. The rally cries are to “confront the brutal facts” and “go big or go home.” It all sounds so exciting and motivating until one common problem shows up, namely that everyone wants harmony through out the entire process.

Effective teams who plan for the future, and effective leaders who help make those plans become real understand that airing ideological differences with passion and having tumultuous meetings is a normal part of strategic planning. While avoiding personal attacks, effective leaders and teams do engage in regular and in-depth strategic dialogue where conflicting ideas are explored and debated.

However, many organizations are experiencing strategic paralysis because they do not want to take the time or make the effort to create this depth of clarity.  They are afraid feelings will be hurt. So, instead of dealing with the real issues, they choose the easy out and seek modest aspirations rather than dealing with the complex strategic challenges before the organization. 

Given the above, we need a new generation of leaders who know how to lead people through the world of strategic and organizational change. We need leaders who understand how functional teams work, who recognize the right choices to be made, and who can create positive forward momentum. We need leaders who are playing to win rather than simply playing to avoid difficulty.

If you are looking to build this kind of capacity in your organization, then now is the time to enroll these individuals in the 2014 From Vision to Action Leadership Training. Through this challenging, interactive curriculum which blends lectures, selected readings, small and large group discussions, and how to skill-building exercises, participants in this four part leadership training gain critical knowledge and skills which will improve their ability to be become better strategic and operational leaders.

For more information on how to register for the 2014 From Vision to Action Leadership Training, please click on the following link: http://www.chartyourpath.com/VTA-Leadership-Training.html

Planning for 2018 and 2020 are important activities.  Now is the time to make sure you have the leaders who can plan effectively and implement those important plans once they are ready.

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

Preparing For The New Year

As we come to the end of the calendar year, I have one question for you.

What do you want to be known for in 2014? 

It seems like a simple question on one hand. Yet, with further reflection, it is actually quite important and can be complex, too.

First, the answer to this question and your current strategic plan should be in alignment, i.e. the outcomes of your strategic plan and the answer to the above question should both line up.

Second, your quarterly expectations, goals and priorities as a leader should be moving in the direction of your answer to this important question.

Third, every strategic review should be focused on helping your organization to move more efficiently and effectively toward this answer.

So, this week, step back from the day to day work, and answer the above question. Then check on alignment between your answer and your current strategic plan. This is another great way to prepare for the new year.

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

An Interesting Perspective On The Development of Strategy

For many years, I have asked participants in the From Vision to Action Leadership Training to read the book, Leading Change by John Kotter, the Konosuke Matsushita Professor of Leadership, Emeritus at the Harvard Business School and the cofounder of Kotter International. Given Kotter’s eight step model for organizational transformation, first presented back in the mid-nineties, is the national and international gold standard for successful organizational change, it is always important to keep up with his current thinking. Recently, he wrote the lead article for the November 2012 issue of the Harvard Business Review on it’s 90th anniversary called “Accelerate!: How the most innovative companies capitalize on today’s rapid-fire strategic challenges - and still make their numbers. Here is the link: http://hbr.org/2012/11/accelerate/ar/1

The article begins with the following premise: “Although traditional hierarchies and processes - which together form a company’s “operating system” - are optimized for day-to-day business, they can’t handle the challenges of mounting complexity and rapid change.” Therefore, Kotter suggests the development of “a second operating system, devoted to the design and implementation of strategy, that uses an agile networklike structure and a very different set of processes. The new operating system continually assesses the business, the industry, and the organization, and reacts with greater agility, speed, and creativity than the existing one. It complements rather than overburdens the hierarchy, thus freeing the later to do what it’s optimized to do. It actually makes enterprises easier to run and accelerates strategic change.”

According to Kotter in this article, there are three main differences between his original eight-step method for successful large-scale change and the eight “accelerators” for the development of strategy. The first difference is that the eight step method for organizational transformation is sequential while the eight accelerators for the development of strategy are “concurrent and always at work.” The second difference is that the former is “usually driven by a small, powerful core group, whereas the accelerators pull in as many people as possible from throughout the organization to form a volunteer army.”  The third difference is that the former is “designed to function within a traditional hierarchy, whereas the accelerators require the flexibility and agility of a network.” 

The eight accelerators that create this high degree of strategic fitness are similar in many ways to the eight step model, e.g. “create a sense of urgency around a single big opportunity,” “build and maintain a guiding coalition,” etc. However, this complementary system for strategic development, according to Kotter, is based on the following five key principles, namely “many change agents, not just the usual few appointees”, “a want-to and a get-to not just a have-to-mind-set”, “head and heart, not just head”, “much more leadership, not just more management”, and “two systems, one organization.”

First, while I like the idea of dual operating systems as a way to explain how strategy is developed and communicated, I am not entirely sure that Kotter’s new model is all that new. I have seen numerous organizations over the last 20+ years create this dual operating system model without out calling it something new and different. While Kotter’s new model is very specific in how the strategic development operating system should be created, I think many large and small companies can embrace the idea and then modify it in simple ways to meet their needs. 

Second, I do not know if they need to create an entire networklike structure that runs parallel to their traditional hierarchy to formulate and implement strategy. The best companies that I have seen each have a unique system for the on-going development of strategy. However, from my perspective, the critical part to their successful implementation of strategy revolves around the generation of a deep level of clarity, ownership, and understanding of strategy within the entire organization. It is the clarity that makes the strategy effective not simply having an entirely separate structure for the development of strategy.

Third, I also want to note that in the later half of this article Kotter explains that he has only utilized this new method in eight companies, and that it is critical for the strategic development guiding coalition to be in close communication with the more traditional executive management team. Furthermore, according to Kotter, if a company is based on a control-oriented hierarchy, this new model is quite helpful. But, having taught leadership since the eighties and been involved with countless strategic development projects, I find very few companies with control based hierarchies to be successful and strategically agile. Control based methods of working and leading people are typically the main problem for why the company is struggling strategically. From my perspective, if one changes this form of leadership, then many of the problems will fade away related to strategic development and implementation. 

Still, I do encourage everyone to read this article as over the years Kotter’s perspectives always generate considerable discussion and introspection throughout the world of business. And who knows, maybe in twenty years it will become the new gold standard for strategic development. Until then, keep reading and learning!

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