Be Different or be dead

February 6, 2023

Why amazing leaders spend their Wednesday as the Strategy Hawk

My book, BE DiFFERENT or be dead, A Weekly Calendar for Leaders highlights Wednesday as the day the audacious leader embeds themselves in the workplace looking for strategic clues.

As the leader, today is your opportunity to walk about the organization and audit how well the strategy of the organization is being executed. It is the chance to discover for yourself how the strategy is being implemented in every nook and cranny of the organization.

The success of the strategy doesn’t happen on paper or in the bowels of the planning department.

It succeeds in the trenches where people deal with the “unreasonable” demands made by customers, the pressure inflicted by competitors and the rules, policies & procedures mandated by your organization that sometimes impede progress.

On this day, you are looking for things that work in favour of effective strategy EXECUTION  and barriers and roadblocks that work against it.

You are also a teacher on this day.

When you spot an issue or behavior in the workplace that impedes progress toward your strategic goals, stop and take the time to paint a picture of what actions are required to brilliantly execute.

You are not criticizing or chastising anyone; you are showing them the way as a coach and mentor.

This day requires you to be intimately knowledgeable about how every function in your organization must act to deliver your strategy.
What new actions do people have to take in marketing, sales, customer service, internal audit, human resources and engineering?

I’ve frequently discussed my concept of Line of Sight , which describes defining the specific critical actions that must be taken and behaviours that must be exhibited by the various functions and departments in an organization in order to effectively execute its strategy.

Line of sight means behaving in such a way that the employee is able to “see” the strategy and deliver outcomes (revenue from specific customer segments, premium prices, customer experiences and products for example) that the strategy demands.

Direct line of sight is the ability to describe in absolute clarity the specific actions and behaviors people need to exhibit to precisely execute the chosen direction.

Indirect line of sight, on the other hand, clouds the path between strategy and action.
The relationship between what the strategy demands and what the employee does is vague and imprecise.
There is limited ability to see the direct relationship required between employee action and strategic outcome.
It is not clear which actions and behavior are necessary to brilliantly execute the plan.

As a result of indirect line of sight, energy is wasted, inconsistency reigns and the strategy is compromised.

As the Strategy Hawk , you must know your strategy on such an intimate level that you can define in specific terms what people need to do to deliver the strategy pristinely all day, every day.

The Hawk is a translator in this sense with the rare ability to make the strategy real for every one in every department in the organization.

Plan your days. List the departments you intend to visit over the coming weeks.
Prioritize them according to the influence they have over delivering your strategy’s results. If marketing’s role is the most critical, spend more time with them.

Observe, ask questions, take notes and teach. And be prepared to delve into the details.

If people don’t know what specifically they need to do to deliver the strategy, they will invent their own actions and behaviors resulting in a strategy that is delivered inconsistently and ineffectively.

Organizational “chaos” is the result of people creating their own meaning of the plan and doing what they think is right.
You don’t want everyone doing their own thing when it comes to strategy execution.

Audacious leaders reinforce the behaviors that don’t need to change; emphasize and demonstrate those that are DiFFERENT and need to be adopted.

Cheers,
Roy
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• Posted 2.6.23 at 04:40 am by Roy Osing
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