CHAPTER 7

Confronting the Elusive: Moving from Planning to Acting

 

Failure to execute plans is a virtually universal problem. So why is the solution to the problem so elusive?

Legendary executive Larry Bossidy, whose career as a senior executive at General Electric and CEO of Honeywell defined excellence, says failure to execute plagues almost all businesses large and small. The ability to move from thinking and planning to acting and accomplishing challenges everyone.

In Execution: The Discipline of Getting Things Done (New York: Crown Books, 2002), the book Bossidy coauthored with the globally renowned consultant Ram Charan, he says: “When companies fail to deliver on their promises, the most frequent explanation is that the CEO’s strategy was wrong. But the strategy itself is not the cause. Strategies most often fail because they aren’t executed well. Things that are supposed to happen don’t happen. Either the organizations aren’t capable of making them happen, or the leaders of the business misjudge the challenges their companies face in the business environment, or both.”

And the Project Management Institute affirms these beliefs. In a 2013 research paper titled “Why Good Strategies Fail: Lessons for the C-Suite,” the institute found that even though 88 percent of executives surveyed are convinced that carrying out strategic plans must be a priority, their own companies are not following through. More than 60 percent admitted that their organizations had trouble converting strategy formulation into strategy implementation. Over a recent three-year period, almost half of all initiatives had not succeeded.

So this raises the question we started with: If failure is so universal, why is the solution so elusive?

Bossidy proposes a tripartite answer. Execution fails because it’s not approached with the necessary discipline; it’s not embraced as the top leader’s responsibility, and it’s not a part of the organization’s culture.

We agree, but we also know that TTW offers some simple approaches that can make a big difference in successfully moving from think to win to acting to succeed.

Let’s start with two TTW concepts: First, the importance of how action rooted in the situation assessment phase of TTW facilitates the flow from planning to action; and second, how teams can be a significant factor.

A solid umbrella statement that leads to a robust and relevant situation assessment actually contains the seeds of the initiatives that are the basis for execution. If tight linkage exists throughout the planning phase, execution becomes seamless.

The way to make sure things happen is through teams, whether they are formal or informal. Strategies get executed by the work people do. They work on projects; they work on tasks; and they work together as teams. To be successful, we must ask specific people to do specific things. Initiatives are these specifics, and people carrying them out should have a clear understanding of how their efforts are connected to what the company is trying to achieve. Each initiative needs to be aligned with a particular strategy, as shown in Figure 7.1.

FIGURE 7.1.   ALIGN ALL ACTIONS WITH STRATEGIES.

Putting Teams in Place

In this composite, Steve is the new brand manager for THRIVE organic baby foods. The brand has been struggling, and now sits far behind Beech-Nut and Gerber. Steve’s corporate executives tell him that the first priority for the division is to grow market share. Having put THRIVE through an extensive situation assessment and SWOT analysis, Steve and his team identify THRIVE’s strong positioning and market strength with Latino families as a sustainable competitive advantage (SCA). Latinos will account for more than half of all population growth for many years; more than one in four children will be born each year into Hispanic households. Surveys show that Latino parents have a strong and growing preference for organic baby foods, and they are willing to pay more for them. Moreover, their survey responses indicate that parents are disappointed in the flavor choices available. This was a place where THRIVE believed it could play and win—an avenue for growth that it made the choice to exploit.

So Steve puts together a team to plan the execution. He tapped four colleagues from various departments in the division. Having Latino voices on the team was a priority, as was having people who had been through the parenting experience. At their first meeting, they established their team charter, which was specific to this initiative and contained six elements: membership, assumptions, significance/objectives, interdependencies, longer-term deliverables, and timing/communication. Several key questions help define each element:

1. Membership:

  Who is the sponsor?

  Who is the core team, team leader, team facilitator?

  What is the transition plan for team members over the life of the initiative?

2. Assumptions:

  What do we assume to be true?

  What is in place that we can use?

3. Significance/objectives:

  What is the significance of the initiative to the business?

  What is the initiative intended to accomplish, and what will signal success?

  What are the quantifiable targets of the initiative?

  What are the longer-term deliverables?

4. Interdependencies:

  Who are the stakeholders necessary for success?

  Who else do we depend on for products, ideas, and information who are not on the team?

  Who do we need to keep in the loop?

  Where is work already being done?

5. Short- and long-term deliverables:

  What do we need to deliver in the next 30, 60, or 90 days?

  What will we deliver over the next one to three years?

  What will help sustain our success?

6. Timing/communication:

  What is the anticipated initiative duration?

  What is the plan and schedule for keeping the sponsors, steering committee, core team, functional managers, and other key stakeholders involved and informed?

As we can see from Figure 7.2, the charter Steve’s team developed spells out the details—who are involved, who are tangentially connected, and what they are going to produce in both the short and long term.

FIGURE 7.2.   WORKING GROUP: GROW LATINO MARKET SHARE.

Review the Choices

With their charter set and with increasing market share among Latinos as their target, Steve and his team must decide how to leverage their SCA. They faced a difficult challenge. Not only were they up against formidable competitors, but the overall category, with the exception of the Latino market, was declining. They needed one or more initiatives that would deliver a bigger slice of a shrinking pie.

The strategy was to grow market share through targeted products for the Latino market. Initiatives to be considered included:

  Develop and market three new organic products based on classic Caribbean and Central American flavors.

  Increase advertising on Spanish language radio and television.

  Improve product placement in bodegas and local markets.

  Develop separate brand with Spanish labeling.

How would Steve and his team choose among them? By thinking them through. As always with TTW, the key is asking the right questions:

  Degree of impact on strategy: How much of the strategy would be satisfied by the successful completion of the initiative?

  Organizational readiness: Is the organization currently a help or a hindrance to the successful completion of the initiative?

  Capabilities: Does the organization have the skills, experience, and know-how to drive the initiative?

Steve and his team debated the relative merits of each initiative and then ranked them, using a simple scale of 1 to 3 to gauge their degree of impact: 1 = low, 2 = medium, or 3 = high. The higher the degree of impact, the more likely they would be to commit to the initiative. These were the results:

  Develop and market three new products based on classic Caribbean and Central American flavors: 3

  Increase advertising on Spanish language radio and television: 2

  Improve product placement in bodegas and local markets: 1

  Develop separate brand with Spanish language labeling: 2

Since the third initiative was rated as having low impact, it was eliminated in favor of the remaining initiatives that had more potential.

Steve already knew that the team dialogue about ranking had a value all its own that was almost as important as the ranking itself. A focused discussion about the merits of the various initiatives, with input from the entire team, is often a major step toward securing buy-in from the colleagues who would carry them out. The interchange among team members can also help shape the mindset of the unit as a whole.

During an intense debate about the merits of a direct appeal to ethnicity, two team members convinced fellow members that the approach would be insensitive and too blunt. They argued that it would be a poor choice. The best way to reach Latina women, they said, would be to approach them as mothers, talk about the mother-baby connection, and connect with their strong desires to raise healthy children. This insight was also useful in developing a promotional campaign for the new products.

Steve and his team then considered the next key question: How ready is your organization to carry out the initiative? In other words, what barriers would potentially block its success, and what boosters or enablers would help? They found two potential difficulties and two sources of support, and ranked them on the same 1 to 3 scale. (See Table 7.1.)

TABLE 7.1.   ORGANIZATIONAL READINESS: DEVELOP AND MARKET THREE NEW PRODUCTS BASED ON CLASSIC CARIBBEAN AND CENTRAL AMERICAN FLAVORS

As with ranking potential impact, team dialogue on barriers and enablers also has merit and can form the basis for constructive discussion on whether to proceed with the initiative. In general, barriers carry more weight than enablers. Steve realized that it was likely they would proceed with the initiative and would ask the team to develop a plan to both leverage the enablers and reduce the barriers.

Steve and his team then considered whether the company had the necessary skills and experience to support the initiative. If not, could it readily obtain them? Without capability, neither the initiatives nor the strategies they support will succeed. Steve realized that for this initiative to be successful, it would be imperative to lock down a secure supply of tropical fruit, including mangos, guavas, and plantains. The team determined that although it would be preferable to designate someone within THRIVE to be responsible for this task, it would be faster and more efficient to job it out to an independent supplier.

For initiatives that require a specialized skill, in-house capability is usually preferable. But if that capability is lacking, it may take a long time and serious investment to develop. When time is a critical factor, “growing your own” may not be feasible. When the New Balance running shoe company decided to add a clothing line, senior leadership realized that expertise in apparel did not exist in-house and could not be developed quickly enough to fit the desired time frame. To execute that strategy, New Balance chose instead to acquire another company that already had experience in manufacturing and marketing athletic wear. When outside know-how needs to be imported, the cost of bringing in these skills ought to be determined at the outset.

Identify and Manage the Initiatives

Once initiatives are selected, they must be managed. There are three factors to keep in mind: scope, time, and costs. Initiatives have size and features. They are time bound. And they consume money and resources. These are the triple trade-offs, and they are completely interdependent. Like three meshed gears, if one turns, they all turn. If one goes off kilter, they all stop. A further look at our example shows how this is the case. (See Table 7.2.)

TABLE 7.2.   IDENTIFY AND MANAGE THREE NEW PRODUCTS BASED ON CLASSIC CARIBBEAN AND CENTRAL AMERICAN FLAVORS

The initiative looks promising, and it appears to be well thought out. But let’s consider the what ifs. What if things change, as they always do? What if the budget has to be cut by $200,000? What if the time frame telescopes down to six months from a year because stakeholders are impatient and want to see faster results? What if senior management wants a bigger scope—more new flavors, a wider rollout, or both—with no increase in budget?

Most frequently, either the budget is cut, or the time frame shrinks. If these cuts occur, then scope must be cut as well. In managing an initiative, when one variable changes, there must be a response in the others. Initiatives can succeed only when time, scope, and money are in balance.

To Build a Road Map to Success, Think Results, Not Activities

What specific steps are necessary to carry out the initiative? If we think back to the best experience we’ve ever had planning an event, in hindsight it’s easy to recall all the interim milestones hit to get there—the accomplishments produced along the path to a successful conclusion. There’s a lesson in that insight that can be harnessed in designing a road map for carrying out initiatives.

We step into the future and place ourselves at the end of our successfully completed initiative. Then we look back to see where we’ve been. When we practice the Try This exercise, we see that this technique can be easily adapted for charting the course of an initiative.

TRY THIS

Accountability

Once we’ve identified the tasks that will get us there and the order in which they must be completed, we must decide who’s going to do the completing. It’s as easy as A, C, S. A is the person who is accountable— the primary go-to person who is committed to delivering the result. Whoever it is owns the result. Accountability can’t be assigned to others, or by others. C stands for collaborators; typically there will be more than one. Cs are actively involved; they are A’s helping hands. In our experience, projects with collaborators have better outcomes. With collaborators, team members are not just accountable to complete the task, but also to one another. S stands for stakeholders. Who outside you and your team is affected by your completion of this result?

Table 7.3 illustrates an accountability matrix. It lists each result that must occur on the road to completing the initiative and the date by which it must be finished. For each result, letters are assigned to identify the type of commitment each team member will have, task by task.

TABLE 7.3.   ACCOUNTABILITY MATRIX

Chapter Summary

  TTW offers some simple approaches that can make a big difference in successfully moving from thinking and planning to win to acting to succeed. To start, initiatives must flow from, and be closely linked to, strategies.

  Setting up a team, selecting the right mix of members, and agreeing on a team charter are important success drivers. The team charter, which is specific to the initiative, contains six elements: membership, assumptions, significance/objectives, interdependencies, short- and long-term deliverables, and timing/communication.

  Team members should have a real voice in defining initiatives and who will have responsibility for completing them.

  When possible, initiatives are identified, and their relative merits are discussed and then ranked, using a simple scale of 1 to 3 to gauge their degree of impact: 1 = low, 2 = medium, 3 = high.

  As with ranking potential impact, the team also must assess the potential barriers and enablers to each initiative and develop a plan both to leverage the enablers and to reduce the barriers.

  Managing initiatives calls for keeping three factors in mind—scope, time, and costs. These triple tradeoffs are completely interdependent. Like three meshed gears, if one turns, they all turn. If one goes off kilter, they all stop.

  With initiatives in place, tasks are identified, the order in which they must be completed mapped out, and responsibilities assigned, using the A, C, and S model. A is the accountable person; C is the supporting collaborator, and S is the interested stakeholder.

Chapter 7 Exercises

How to Get Strategies Done

Mastering How to Develop and Manage Initiatives

Without initiatives and action plans, there is a high likelihood your strategies will not be fulfilled and your goals will not be met. In order to see your strategies executed, ask the following:

  How do we get this done?

  What are the most important projects, programs, or results necessary to deliver our strategies?

  Which strategy do they support?

  What specifics need to be accomplished?

  When do they have to be completed? And who are involved?

Exercise: Defining Initiatives
(Can be done at individual or group level)

Decide on initiatives:

1. Choose a strategy.

2. Identify at least three potential initiatives that are necessary to achieve the strategy.

3. Assess and rank order your initiatives against the following criteria:

  Impact

  Readiness

  Capabilities

4. Choose which initiatives you are recommending to do and why.

5. Discuss with others for

  Clarity

  Alignment on initiatives

The deliverable is a draft of initiatives for each strategy.

Mastering TTW Team Charters

You need to create the team charter.

Exercise: Create the Team Charter

Execution of initiatives happens in teams. Select a team to design and implement the detailed work. A team charter ensures that it has explicit deliverables and a plan to accomplish the work. A team charter should answer the six categories of questions listed below.

For membership:

  Who is the sponsor (advocate)?

  Who makes up the core team?

  Who is the team leader?

  Who is the team facilitator?

  What is the transition plan for team members over the life of the initiative?

For assumptions:

  What do we assume to be true?

  What is in place that we can use?

For significance/objectives, initiative relevance, performance standards, and metrics (key performance indicators):

  What is the importance (significance) of the initiative to the business?

  What is the initiative intended to accomplish and what will signal success?

  What are the quantifiable targets of the initiative?

For interdependencies:

  Who are the stakeholders necessary for success?

  Who else do we depend on for products, ideas, and information who are not on this team?

  Who do we need to keep in the loop?

  Where is work already being done?

For deliverables:

  What do we need to deliver in the next 30, 60, or 90 days?

  What will we deliver over the next one to three years?

  What will sustain our achievements?

For timing/communication:

  What is the anticipated initiative duration?

  Communication: What is the plan and schedule for keeping the sponsors, steering committee, core team, functional managers, and other key stakeholders involved and informed?

Mastering Your Network

Exercise: Creating a Network Diagram

Now do the following as you refer to Figure 7.3:

FIGURE 7.3.   CHARTER ELEMENTS FOR TEAMS.

1. Draw a circle with you/your team in the center.

2. Identify other key stakeholders.

3. Connect/draw a line between your team and other stakeholders:

  1 line—low dependency

  2 lines—moderate dependency

  3 lines—high dependency

4. Next to each stakeholder, assess the level of effectiveness between your team and the stakeholders; 1, 2, or 3 stars:

  1 star—low effectiveness

  2 stars—medium effectiveness

  3 stars—highly effective

5. Wherever you have 2 or 3 lines and only 1 or 2 stars, the initiative’s progress can be blocked. Highlight these as potential barriers.

6. With the help of your table team, develop an action plan to collaborate more effectively thus reducing or eliminating the potential barriers to your initiative’s success.

7. Remember to include only those actions that are within your circle of influence.

Mastering the Road Map to Completion

Exercise: Creating a Results-Based Road Map

1. “Step into the future” and pick a date by which you visualize the initiative being successfully completed.

2. Using Post-it notes—each person identifies the results the team needs to produce in order to deliver the initiative.

3. Group reads and removes the duplicates.

4. Sequence from left to right by asking each other:

What result must occur first (some will happen simultaneously)?

What happens next, and so on until all the Post-its have been sequenced?

5. Assign accountabilities for each result:

  Accountable. This is the individual who owns this particular result.

  Collaborators. Typically two or three people actively involved in delivering the result.

  Stakeholders. People not actively involved in carrying out the initiative, but who have a definite interest in its success, and who may be able to play a resource procurement or other supportive role.

6. Create your visual road map. Remember to use result language.

Organizational Assessment

Use the following table as a checklist for identifying TTW principles and practices. This will help you to better understand where you and your team need to focus your energies. To get an idea where you believe your organization stands, read through each statement and jot down a rating:

Review individual items. Look for items where you scored lower (3 and below) and think about the following questions:

  What do I believe is driving the score?

  What do I need to stop, start, or continue doing?

  What do I hope the result to be?