December 2, 2009

BE DiFFERENT Planning Process

I am convinced that the reason many organizations don’t develop a strategy to move them forward is due to the complicated and expensive process touted by most strategy development practitioners.

Numerous people gather in a room for a Strategic Planning Session, subject matter experts descend of the group and try to impress everyone with their detailed knowledge of the many governing factors that need consideration in the strategy building process, and many days are consumed (yes, I’ll say it: wasted) to get the essence of the strategy ‘perfect’. Notwithstanding the fact that a Plan will never be perfect no matter how much analysis and time is put into it, the all-consuming plan takes so much time and energyof the planning participants there is insufficient tme left to develop how the plan (fallacious perfection) will be executed in the trenches by real people.

Normally the services of a third party firm are used to both facilitate the session and provide expert content to the plan direction and efficacy. This is a clever way of avoiding having the people responsible for the Strategy’s success taking ownership of the direction taken by applying heir own opinions and good judgement. They are presented with material, ask questions about various aspects of it and in the end most of the time agree with it.

Given that eventually any strategy or plan must result in action, the BE DiFFERENT planning process is predicated on the premise: keep it simple, get to the gut issues quickly and ACT. Minimize the strategic essence planning time; maximize the implementation action planning time.

Here’s the process I have used both as an executive for TELUS where I was responsible for leading many different types of businesses of various sizes and competitive maturity. Answer 3 questions and you have your strategy:
    - HOW BIG do you want to be? Define your growth goals first.
    - WHO do you want to SERVE? Select the customer group that has the potential to deliver your growth goals.
    - HOW will you compete and WIN? Declare how will you BE DiFFERENT from you competition.

Cheers, Roy Osing
Remember to follow me on Twitter
Do the BE DiFFERENT Quiz

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Roy’s Rule of Three
Strategy Hawk
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Role of Your Strategy Document 
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Posted 12.2.09 at 09:06 am by Roy Osing | Permalink | Comments (0)

December 1, 2009

Ten BE DiFFERENT Practices to Renew your Organization

The airwaves these days are filled with commentary on the current global economic challenges faced by many countries and the highly volatile market conditions threatening business success. Even as we seem to moving out of the doldrums, nearly every aspect of the situation is being portrayed in a very negative way - the sky is falling, the sky is falling!

The descriprtions used—business failure, government bail-out, plummeting consumer demand, record levels of consumer debt, unemployment, fear, loss of economic confidence and uncertainty—paint a dismal picture of a presumed and inevitable cataclysmic outcome.

There is no question that the potential impacts of a declining economy and volatile markets are severe indeed. Businesses HAVE failed and unemployment continues to be a concern.

That said, any economic/market dilemma presents an opportunity to organizations willing to renew themselves: to implement real change based on BE DiFFERENT Practices.

Since the beginning of the industrial age, businesses and organizations have had difficulty changing their established direction or charting a new course. Inertia is a force that most have a tough time overcoming. It is much more comfortable managing the momentum of a business - led by change managers - than making the difficult decisions necessary to put the organization on a different course - a role assumed by Change Leaders.

To change the fundamental course of an organization requires that business risk be endured and that discontinuity be imposed on how the organization operates. 

Major change in an organization happens when significant events force leadership to take a different direction, indeed to often intervene upon itself. Events such as the appointment of a new CEO, a merger or acquisition or, in the case of the telecommunications industry, the introduction of competition into traditional monopoly markets are all key drivers of change. 

Why are economic slow-downs and extreme market fluctuations not generally regarded as one of these BIG events that could be considered by organizational leaders to be the stimulus of major change? Is the glass half full or half empty?

Considering change as a threat reflects the former perspective. An economic challenge as a driver of renewal speaks to the latter. This is NOT the time to hunker down; it is the time to set a BE DiFFERENT course for your organization and get on with it.

The sky isn’t falling; it offers the potential for an organization to equip itself with the road-map and competencies to not only survive economic and market threats but also to thrive and prosper in them and to position them for prosperity when the bull returns - and it is. 

The truth is this:  you really have no choice. Staying the course of an unsatisfactory strategy will not get you to where you need to go. You will continue to float downward and suffer with the end result. To do nothing is NOT an option.

Organizations must act, they must look for ways to renew themselves and navigate these troublesome times. Economic and market threats are your friends; let them lead you to your renewed future -  a better world for your customers, employees and owners.

What does the BE DiFFERENT Renewal Process look like? What are the steps that can be followed to take the negative energy imposed on an organization and turn it into a positive force for change?

Here are the ten BE DiFFERENT Practices that will position you as a long term winner.

Practice #1 - Renew your Strategy
Practices #2, #3 and #4 - Focus, Modify Business Processes and Cut the Crap
Practices #5 and #6 - Be Anal about Execution and Set Cost Objectives
Practices #7 and #8 - Plan on the Run and Customerize your Marketing
Practices #9 and #10 - Dazzle your Customers and Sell Intimate Relationships

Cheers, Roy Osing

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Posted 12.1.09 at 04:52 pm by Roy Osing | Permalink | Comments (0)

November 27, 2009

Momentum Management vs Change Leadership

It is very easy to get into the relaxing position of staying the current course of your business. Continuing to manage your organizational affairs with the assumption that what got you here will get you where you need to get to. This is momentum management.

The reality is of course that the marketplace rarely lets us get away with this. It is always changing as a result of demand, competitive and economic factors. The most extreme case in point is the current economic downturn which is ravaging businesses that continue to do things the way they have always done them assuming that eventually they will pay off.

When things are going well (growing demand for your services, loyal customers and healthy market position) we can disguise certain inefficiencies but when things are not going well we stand raw naked in the marketplace completely exposed and will be punished for our inadequacies. I particularly like how Steve Gedeon from Ryerson Entrepreneur Institute Ted Rogers School of Business described this situation in a recent article in the National Post. He said ‘When the wind is blowing fast enough, even turkeys can fly. But as soon as that wind dies down, the turkeys start dropping.’

The point is that in the face of constant unpredictability you need to be driving change in your organization, you need to be a Change Leader.You need to be forcing organizational discontinuity to prevent the momentum management dilemma from happening. I appreciate that change, particularly being the forcing agent of it, is uncomfortable. But if you want to be identified with moving your team successfully into the future and avoiding the recessionary road kill you really have no choice.

Th essence of Change Leadership is to BE DiFFERENT. To initiate new creative ways to cause an overwhelming distinction between you and your competitors. To take responsibility for this change within you organization. To take risks. Yes, to make mistakes but to learn from them. To be the BE DiFFERENT champion to which all Momentum Managers would like to aspire to, but never will due to the inertia they possess and the momentum they wish to promulgate.

Cheers, Roy Osing

Remember to follow me on Twitter
Do the BE DiFFERENT Quiz

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Posted 11.27.09 at 05:18 am by Roy Osing | Permalink | Comments (1)

November 24, 2009

Be Anal about Execution

Chapter 18 of my book, BE DiFFERENT, advances the notion that we spend far too much time planning what we intend to do as an organization and not enough time figuring out how we will get there. The challenge is expressed a number of ways but I think Peter Drucker nailed it when he said ‘The biggest challenge for most businesses is executing well - not devising helium-filled plans for reaching the next level.’ How true. But this has been aid over and over forever it seems yet organizations toil on believing the essence of their strategy will ‘deliver them from evil’. The fact is it won’t, and unless execution gets recognition as the true driver of success we will continue to witness the demise of businesses.

The BE DiFFERENT way of addressing this is to understand that results are a function of execution and that requires a disproportionate amount of time be spent on this element of the strategic planning process. I suggest that you devote 20% of your time to determining the essence of your plan and 80% of your time on the detailed implementation plan - who needs to do what by when to breathe life into what you want to achieve. Sooner or later your brave idea must degenerate into a number of crude deeds. Make it a cultural change objective.

In addition, assign a Strategy Hawk to lead the execution process. Select the most senior person with the most tenacity and currency in your organization to do the job. Make it the most
important item in his or her Performance Plan and hold them accountable to deliver the execution deliverables. And communicate openly and regularly on progress made. Execution heroes - find them and recognize them. Hold them up to the rest of the organization as examples to be aspired to.

Get your plan just about right and execute it with tenacity and perseverance through the hearts and souls of turned-on people. That’s BE DiFFERENT. That’s winning. That’s Change Leadership.

Cheers, Roy Osing

Remember to follow me on Twitter

Related Blogs
Roy’s Rule of Three
Strategy Hawk
Plan on the Run
Cut the Crap
The Only Statement
Role of Your Strategy Document 
BE DiFFERENT Quiz
Line of Sight Execution
Avoid Aspirational Intent

Posted 11.24.09 at 05:47 am by Roy Osing | Permalink | Comments (0)