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Execution IS the Strategy
How Leaders Achieve Maximum Results in Minimum Time
Laura Stack
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eBook - ePub
Execution IS the Strategy
How Leaders Achieve Maximum Results in Minimum Time
Laura Stack
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About This Book
Turn Strategy into Performance!In today's world of rapid, disruptive change, strategy can't be separate from executionâit has to emerge from execution. You have to continually adjust your strategy to fit new realities. But if your organization isn't set up to be fast on its feet, you could easily go the way of Blockbuster or Borders.Laura Stack shows you how to quickly drive strategic initiatives and get great results from your team. Her LEAD Formula outlines the Four Keys to Successful Execution: the ability to Leverage your talent and resources, design an Environment to support an agile culture, create Alignment between strategic priorities and operational activities, and Drive the organization forward quickly. She includes a leadership team assessment, group reading guides, and bonus self-development resources. Stack will equip you with the knowledge, skills, and inspiration to help you hit the ground running!
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KEY 1
Leverage
L
LEVERAGE
LEVERAGE
Leadership Role
Engineer: Build It
Engineer: Build It
Development
Opportunity
Talent/Resources
Opportunity
Talent/Resources
When I was a kid, my younger brother Paulâwho later graduated from college with a degree in mechanical engineeringâtaught me how using a lever could make building a snowman easier.
My father is a retired Air Force colonel. I grew up on the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, so Iâm used to snow and lots of it. I remember one particularly big snowstorm that closed school and delivered perfect snowball-making snow. Paul and I naturally decided to make an enormous snowman.
We started with a huge base. Then we rolled a middle snowball nearly as large, and quickly discovered it was so heavy we couldnât lift it. So my clever brother grabbed our Radio Flyer wagon and a wooden 2 Ă 8 beam from my fatherâs shed. Using the wagon as a fulcrum and the board as a lever, he lifted the middle snowball onto the base snowball while I guided it. After that, finishing our snowman was easy.
In the strictest mechanical sense, a lever is a simple machine with a rigid beam that pivots on a fulcrum or fixed hinge to magnify an input force, so the resulting leverage or output force can move heavy objects.
The concept of leverage fits equally well in the workplace, where applying it can facilitate smooth, on-the-spot strategic execution. The same basic components of leverage used to move a snowball apply to any business system. You can leverage physical and financial assets, experience, skill sets, specialized knowledge, and relationships to get the right people in the right roles. This means using the right tools to squeeze every bit of productive work from your team. Itâs also the epitome of learning to do more with lessâa powerful principle in todayâs resource-poor workplaces.
An efficient organization is one that operates with leverage already in place:
⢠The Effort/Input Force = the leader (you)
⢠The Lever/Beam = the worker (employee or team)
⢠The Fulcrum/Pivot = the enabler (tool or resource)
⢠The Load/Object = your organization (what youâre trying to move with your strategy)
The interaction of these components is said to create leverage. Depending upon the strength of your strategy, the leverage created (the output force) can move the object (your organization). If the interaction of this simple machine with its component parts creates enough leverage, your organization will move where you want it to go. Without the right parts in place, movement will be much more difficult.
Put another way, the ability to lift the âsnowballâ in your organization requires increased input force. This is achieved either through a stronger leader, a longer and stronger beam (team members), or a fulcrum of more appropriate size, height, or position (tool or approach), or perhaps even a lighter snowball.
Youâll find it well worth the effort to develop or acquire the authority to leverage your resources and assets at will, not to mention those of your allies and partners. Why? Having the ability to apply the right amount of force at just the right time allows you to take advantage of fast-moving opportunities that may knock only once.
LEVERAGE IN ACTION
My two sons Johnny and James love to eat at the Chick-fil-A near our home. So I was delighted when Roger Blythe, Vice President of Business Analysis at Chick-fil-A, called upon me to work with his team at an upcoming department meeting.
When we chatted about the concept of leverage, Blythe told me,
Thereâs a lot of conversation around here about how to move more quickly. Even though weâre not under the pressure of bad financial results, we do constrain ourselves around the resources that we add every year. Our desires to continuously improve and add new features and services typically exceed the resources we can add in any given year, so thereâs a built-in mechanism that forces us to try to become more efficient.
In my own area, we try to create as much clarity as we possibly can about the goal and what weâre trying to accomplish. Then we hire wonderful peopleâreally smart, bright people who are engagedâand we give them a large amount of freedom and flexibility in executing that plan.
When you have the right people in the right roles and the right tools in place, the leverage gained makes implementing your strategic priorities far easier. So don your engineer hat, and letâs explore ways to build this simple machine so you can help your team execute with greater agility.
CHAPTER 1
Maximize Your Input Force
As Archimedes once said, âGive me a lever long enough and a fulcrum on which to place it, and I shall move the world.â
How do you get more power into your lever? Simple. You have to be a stronger leader. But what, precisely, does that mean in todayâs world? Not what it once did, thatâs for certain. The modern eraâs simpler information exchange, better communications, and increased mobility have altered perceptions of leadership in interesting ways.
Motivational expert Ken Blanchard points out, âIn the past, a leader was a boss. Todayâs leader must be a partner with their people. They can no longer lead solely based on positional power.â
I couldnât agree more. Modern leaders canât afford to be autocrats, because by the time they decide on a strategy, itâs usually out of date. No single individual can keep up with everything in real time. Instead of trying to, the intelligent leader delegates his or her authority as effectively and as widely as possible, encouraging both risk-taking and creativity. That allows the team to transform the organization from within.
Think of it this way: as a leader, you work for your team members. They donât just work for you, although the organizational chart may suggest otherwise. Donât think of yourself as belonging to a different class than your team members just because the categories seem so clear-cut on paper. You all relate to each other along a continuum rather than as separate boxes. (Rare exceptions occur in high-security situations or during war, when compartmentalization is required.)
So why bother even having a leader? Because you need someone to articulate and guide the teamâs mission and vision. The modern leader exists less to tell people what to do than to urge them to do what they already know they should. Rather than controlling every workerâs daily activities, you serve as a nucleus for your team members to rally around. Youâre a catalyst triggering ideas and action, allowing people to succeed without getting in their way.
Letâs consider a few of the many ways you can maximize your input force.
GIVE YOURSELF A HAND!
You have a staff for a reason. Ideally, each team member on your staff possesses talents, knowledge, and abilities that combine to form the extra hands Mother Nature didnât give you.
Speaking of hands, hereâs a helping HANDS approach to keeping your team properly aligned with organization strategyâwithout tipping you over the edge into overwork.
1. Handpick your people. Select each with an eye for the skill set he or she brings to the table, aiming for a little overlap with other team members, but without too much redundancy. Once theyâre on board, get to know them well. Determine their weaknesses and strengths, consider how they might work best together, and decide which tasks should go to whom.
2. Assign duties carefully. Meet with your team leads and parcel out the range of tasks they have authority over. Define the limits of their authority carefully to avoid duplication, but make sure there arenât any cracks for tasks to fall through.
3. Nurture initiative and innovation. In a memorable scene in the 2011 film Captain America, a sergeant tells a group of soldiers out on a run that if one of the men can retrieve the flag from atop a tall flagpole, heâll get a ride back to the barracks. After several soldiers fail to climb the pole, wimpy Steve Rogers takes a look at it, pulls a pin at the base, and pushes it over with his foot. He retrieves the flag and trades it for his ride back to the barracks. Give your people the opportunity to surprise you with their solutions to tasks you assign.
4. Donât abdicate! Delegation is not abdication. Carefully consider how much authority to delegate with the responsibilities you parcel out, but never give it all away. Keep a high-level eye on both team and individual workflow. Intervene if someone doesnât live up to expectations or fouls the works. Do whatever you must to repair an individualâs productivity before the whole teamâs productivity falls apart. As the leader, you bear the ultimate responsibility for every team memberâs success and failure.
5. Study the results. Has delegation reduced your task list to a manageable length? If not, intensify your efforts. Resolve to handle only the high-value items you do best or must do as part of your job. In addition, determine how your delegating has affected the teamâs workflow process. Do you have a well-oiled machine on your hands, or does it move forward in fits and starts? If the latter, rethink who does what and how, and clear the obvious blockages.
Delegating work forms the backbone of any managerial time management strategy, so learn to do it well. You can multiply your hands and extend your brain, thereby accomplishing much more than you ever could alone.
JUST SAY NO TO YOUR INNER CONTROL FREAK
Having a forceful personality provides certain advantages in a competitive workplace. It can help you work your way up the ladder more quickly than you otherwise might. But fair warning: if your favorite management slogan is âmy way or the highway,â expect a few delays in your drive to the top.
You can survive with this attitude, but nobody loves a control freak. Your team will never give you 100 percent if you disempower them, hover over their shoulders, or constantly disparage their abilities or judgment. They will either resent you or get so nervous they wonât be able to do their jobs correctly. And if youâre always poking into their business, you wonât get your job done, either.
Control freaks in leadership positions crush creativity, drive depression, and kill camaraderie. All of these weaken your leverâs input force. Worse, they also block the kind of frontline development and immediate execution of strategy that success depends on. So letâs check on your micromanagement tendencies. Read through these questions carefully and answer them honestly.
⢠Do you often find yourself standing over employeesâ shoulders directing their work?
⢠Do you regularly redo employeesâ work, even as a form of âinstructionâ?
⢠Do you second-guess your employeesâ decisions on a daily basis?
⢠Do you require an approval or sign-off on every task, even minor ones?
⢠Are you convinced of the truth of the old saying, âIf you want something done right, youâve got to do it yourselfâ?
⢠Do you work twelve-plus hours a day?
⢠Do you recheck the work of those youâre responsible for?
⢠Do you have a hard time focusing on the big picture and drown in minutiae instead?
⢠Do you get involved in little $12-per-hour details?
⢠Are you insatiably curious, so much so that you just have to know whatâs going on behind the scenes?
If you answered âYesâ to more than a couple of these questions, then you have micromanager tendencies. You must fight them! If you answered âYesâ to many or all of them (or pretended you didnât), then I have bad news for you: youâre already a micromanager.
Micromanaging drives a stake through the heart of employee productivity; itâs as simple as that. Itâs as much about fear as it is about control. Micromanagers are not necessarily on a power kick; rather, they mistrust everyone. Theyâre afraid if they donât âride herdâ on the team, everyone will make catastrophic errors. Afraid of the consequences of letting go, they hold on to as much of their power as they can.
The result? You create a stifling environment, in which both your time and the employeesâ get wasted. Micromanaging fails right up and down the line. Not only does it exhaust everyone involved, itâs ultimately counterproductive and drives away the best workers.
Furthermore, even when done with the best of intentions and the lightest of touches, micromanaging interrupts people. If you poke someone a half-dozen times a day and ask how far theyâve gotten on an assignment, you canât expect them to get very far. When they have to answer you, it drags them out of their focus. In fact, employees often tell me their manager is their biggest distraction, always swooping in and checking on them, rendering them unable to get anything done.
Given that, where do attention to detail, intelligent oversight, and high professional standards break down and mire you in the trap of micromanagement? It all hinges on trust. When you surround yourself with competent, well-supported people and trust them to do their jobs, micromanaging isnât a problem. But when trust goes out the window, micromanaging springs up like a weed. When lurking and criticizing happen incessantly, both productivity and employee morale go down the drain.
A REAL-WORLD EXAMPLE
I once did training for the vice president in charge of the call center at a large telecom company. She cited overwork and burnout on her team and called me in to help.
Upon further exploration, she proved to be the biggest culprit. I know this seems like common sense, but many leaders simply canât see how theyâre contributing to crazy-making. It quickly became clear why this vice president felt she had no time to think about strategic issues. She insisted on attending meetings that were also attended by the director and manager of that department. She had employees copy her on every e-mail about issues they were resolving internally with customers, so sheâd be âin the know.â
Clearly, itâs unnecessary to have three levels of management represented in each meeting. The vice president should excuse herself, release the appropriate level of authority to her managers, and instruct them to report the results. (Unfortunately, no one was recording action items, because everyone was in attendance.) She should explicitly tell those she trusted to resolve customer escalation issues without copying her on e-mails. She only needed to know about the results in the closeout ticket.
THE BIG T: TRUST
How do you develop the level of trust in your employees thatâs required to inspire productivity and empowerment? I believe it starts with self-awareness. If your organization suffers from low productivity, donât automatically blame your employees; take a look at yourself first. If you donât trust your people to do their jobs well, ask why. Did you make poor choices when you hired them? Are you still learning how to maximize their skills and abilities? Are you paranoid someone will take your job? Have you failed to provide the proper training? Realize that if your involvement is so crucial to your current role that youâre irreplaceable, then you canât be promoted. Thatâs w...