X's and O's versus Storytelling

Usually these are treated as mutually exclusive.

Technical presentations, with exceptions, typically fall in the first category. Details are provided to showcase knowledge and the audience is left to bridge the gap to how the problem will be solved. This also happens when a business case is presented by Subject Matter Experts seeking funding and approval.

Presentations by CEO's and politicians fall in the latter category. These are meant to have 'feel good' outcomes. They are short on specifics but spectacular on entertainment value.

Why not have both? After all, when we are in the audience, we are the 'customer', and we want to 'have it all'.

If we are delivering the message, what do we need to do to both entertain and inform the audience?

Dealing with conflict arising from insecurities

What is more difficult?

1. Dealing with our own insecurities or
2. Dealing with other people as they deal with their insecurities?
   

How do we tell the difference?

Getting to the bottom of this is critical. Solving it is moving towards getting your message understood and accepted and away from getting embroiled in an arguments and misunderstandings.

Use your insecurities to discover your role in creating the problem, suspend judgment as others deal with their insecurities, be part of the solution.

Getting it done

If you want to get it done, there are a few options available:

• Do it yourself: You will feel in control. It will keep you in practice and in touch with the methods and techniques. If done inappropriately, you will alienate others and lose coaching opportunities.
• Delegate: Hire others to do it for you. Has to be done carefully, 'trust' after you have a basis for doing so. 'Trust' is not an emotional word in this context.
• Lead: Influence others to do it. There is often little to offer in return except the perception that the follower is getting something out of following. Don't worry, they will, otherwise they would be foolish to continue following you.

When faced by ambiguous or insurmountable obstacles, pick a path and get started. Mix and match, moving from one to the other as the situation demands. Its annoying to have to change paths, not to mention sometimes it is difficult; requires a change in mind set and an upgrade in skills. But it can be fun when you accept it as reality.

Above all, do not accept or allow others to accept ambiguity or difficulty as reason for inaction or defensive behavior. In executing your strategy, its an amazing experience stare down the fog and watch it lift to reveal wonderful opportunities.

Consultants versus Employees

Some key differences:

• Consultants get paid more per hour.
• Consultants can be let go without a lot of justification and paperwork.
• Employees get benefits, consultants have to get their own.
• Consultants get to (legally) work for multiple organizations.
• Employees have to worry about dealing with organization politics for furthering their career.
• Consultants are expected to be specialized and be very, very good at what they do. Not every employee needs to be best in class in what they do, they need to demonstrate general management skills and depend on collaboration/teamwork.
• Employees can be rewarded in ways consultants can't: stock options, bonuses, recognition, paid vacations etc.
  

Otherwise, they seem to be very similar:

• Both have to worry about contract/employment renewals and finding their next gig. Apart from some exceptions, those days of doing the same job lifelong are gone.
• Both have to continuously provide value: immediate and long term.
• Both have to continuously develop skills to stay current with their chosen areas of interest.
• Both have to show entrepreneurial behavior to make a difference and to move to the next level.

At some level, this could be a pedantic argument. The point here is, employees have a lot to gain by learning from what consultants do to be successful. For certain tasks, the lines between them blur and are irrelevant.

Ability versus Willingness

Once alignment and agreement has been gained on the plan to meet customer outcomes, it is time for the organization to manage performance as it executes on the plan. Since plans are executed by people, there are two factors to consider in aligning incentives to get them to perform: ability and willingness.

'Ability' is a measure of capability to solve problems. It can be and is developed by education, training and experience. In a dynamic world, abilities get obsolete fast and need to evolve rapidly and adapt to new situations. Sometimes abilities take time to identify, formalize and pass on to others. This requires pioneers to excel in adapting to new situations. If abilities are low, provide incentives to develop abilities. Then provide incentives for meeting or exceeding performance targets.

'Willingness' is a measure of determination in the face of adversity. It is a psychological response shaped by many factors like self-confidence and self-esteem. It can be developed by conditioning the body and mind. Low willingness can drag down people with superior abilities (the race goes not to the strongest or the swiftest...). High willingness can overcome deficiencies in abilities (fake it till you have it...). If willingness is low, find out why. Paying someone to be willing is not scalable. Achieving superior performance requires them to be motivated by and enjoy the process of problem solving required to execute strategy.

If you are seeking to improve performance, be sure to first identify which is deficient, ability or willingness. Applying the wrong solution may make the problem worse.

End-to-end

When someone says your solution is not 'end-to-end', are they saying your solution is:

• Deficient in some way?
• They need the solution scope to be expanded?

Sometimes its hard to tell when someone is pointing out a genuine improvement opportunity versus scoring points.

One way to prevent arguments and debates is to define what 'end-to-end' means for the audience. First define the value chain needed to meet a customer outcome. Then pick a starting and ending point for your solution and explain why that is chosen.

After defining scope you can turn your attention to 'how' the end-to-end solution will be build. Some pieces of the solution may be outsourced and others may be built in house. Some pieces may be available off the shelf, others need to be custom built. Sometimes putting together a solution requires new business models and joint ventures.

Use visuals to help the audience see what is 'in' and what is 'out'. Scope may be altered based on capabilities, so the 'what' and the 'how' have to interact iteratively to get the end-to-end picture.

Learn from butlers

To many, the word 'butler' is synonymous with 'servant'. However, butlers are also knows to be very influential over their 'masters'. What makes them successful?

1. They have an uncanny grasp over the issues central to the problem.
2. They have connected the dots and can defend their reasoning and conclusion.
3. They communicate it in a very respectful manner, without grovelling.
4. Their body language makes it very clear that they know what they are talking about while communicating respect. In fact, their displeasure is hard to bear, forcing the 'master' to look at things from their point of view.
   
5. They let the 'master' make the call and even make it seem like it is the 'master's' idea.
6. They are right enough times to gain leverage in the relationship.
7. If overruled, they are ready with a backup solution, without a 'I told you so' attitude.

Solutions are no good if not sponsored and adopted. You will not always be the top dog and get to use command and control. (We will debate elsewhere whether that is a good strategy to begin with)

Learn effective communication from butlers, make your point forcefully without being obsequious or domineering.

Teaching an old dog new tricks

In dealing with a diverse audience, be prepared to work with those who are very set in their ways or who have very strongly held need to be 'in charge' or 'in control'.

The following options would be dysfunctional and are not scalable:

• Open confrontation. If you win, now you have to watch your back all the time. Not to mention, others are also watching and know how you deal with conflict.
• Sabotage and subterfuge. This is same as the previous point, except you are keeping quiet about it. Frankly, this will lower trust even more.
• Retreat or flight. Getting a different job takes time. Besides, what will you do if a similar situation occurs again?

Your specific strategies and tactics will vary. Even if you 'lose' the argument or are forced to comply with a different idea, you can still come out ahead and develop your assets in many ways:

• Be remembered for how you handled the situation.
• Be fair.
• Suspend judgment.
• Offer to help and remove obstacles in the 'opposing' idea.

The old adage, 'if you can't fight 'em (and win), join 'em', is still valid. Do it in a positive manner, instead of becoming a martyr. Displaying integrity, honesty and being a role model is a long term approach and requires sacrifice of short term wins.

Look ahead to see what conflicts could arise 'beyond the horizon' and prepare well. You can out-maneuver your opponents and win them over by offering value and making them successful. Conflicts and misunderstandings arise because your value proposition is not clear or you are not communicating it clearly.

Tasseography

Tasseography is a the practice of fortune-telling by interpreting patterns in tea leaves, coffee grounds, or wine sediments.

This sounds crazy, unless

• You believe it and/or
• It has worked for you.

Some examples of complex problem solving which seem mystical:

• Medical doctors diagnosing an illness
• Coaches evaluating an athlete's potential
• An analysis of what it takes to turn around a failing company
• Bringing social change by working to eliminate deeply rooted and dysfunctional beliefs (e.g. smoking is cool)

If you are facing any of these (or similar) situations, you may turn to experts to help. These experts will charge a premium price and not be able to provide any guarantees anyway. (We can debate on whether the expectation of a guarantee is reasonable in the first place, but that would be digressing).

Most problem solving in real life is like tasseography, until the realization sets in that predictable problem solving is a matter of understanding patterns and the cause-effect relationships. Each class of problems have unique characteristics that sometimes requires years of effort to acquire. This means you can acquire expertise in some areas but not all.

At a minimum, you need to spend time to understand the underlying principles behind problem solving in a particular domain. Yes, experts are still needed. But if you don't take an interest in the underlying principles, you cannot make an informed decision and take charge of your own destiny. It may be cheaper to read tea leaves, since the end result is the same as not making an effort to get educated.

Finding the right frog to kiss

In the fairy tale, the princess kisses the frog and it turns into a handsome prince. They get married and live happily ever after.

Strategy execution is not as simple or smooth, here are some obstacles:

• Finding the right frog. How do you know it is the right frog?
  
• Sometimes the only way to know is to kiss the frog. Not all frogs turn into a prince.
• Perseverance and resilience is needed to keep kissing frogs till the right one shows up.

The analogy is not perfect, but its close enough to make the following points:

• If the outcome is to get a handsome prince, is kissing a frog the only way? That is the point of defining outcomes: to discover alternate ways to get it.
• Sometimes you have to take a risk, not everything works out the first time you try it.
  
• The less you know about frogs, the more mistakes you will make. Improve your 'frog spotting' skills.

'Values' versus 'Preferences'

A 'value' is a way of signaling 'what is important' to a person, group, team or community.

'Values' are a set of emotional rules followed to make decisions. Values are useful to determine integrity and honesty. It is easier to be aligned and predictable when people share the same values. Values exert moral pressure and are sometimes more effective than rules.

A core group needs to share the same values. Values are the tie-breakers when faced with tough choices. The more deeply rooted a value, the harder it is to change, in self or the other.

A 'preference' is a choice made by stack ranking alternatives. The ranking could be based on objective (value derived, cost saved) or subjective criteria (happiness, pleasure, satisfaction). Its easier to change preferences based on presenting data or proof that an alternative is better than the other.

When faced by tough choices know whether you are faced by a value-driven conflict or a preference-driven conflict. Sometimes it is not easy to tell the difference. Each has a different root cause and hence requires different solutions.

Theory, pedantic, patterns

Words are misused and abused. Or so it seems anyway. Its important to know the underlying meaning of words for you as well as the other person.

Take the word 'theory'. In the corporate world, in a disagreement, proposals are often labeled 'theoretical'. When I looked up the word in Wikipedia, I found the meaning to be:

• An analytic structure designed to explain a set of empirical observations
• Identification of this set of distinct observations as a class of phenomena
• Makes assertions about the underlying reality that brings about or affects this class.

This sounds good until we realize that theories are 'rigorously tentative', meaning, because they are abstract or conceptual, they can be neither right nor wrong. Therefore, in the corporate world, what we need are theorems:

• Theorems are derived deductively from theories according to a formal system of rules, generally as a first step in testing or applying the theory to concrete situations.

I suspect the word that needs to be used to object to an argument is 'pedantic' (pejorative use):

• Overly concerned with formalism and precision, or who makes a show of his learning.

The outcomes sought in executing strategy is 'clarity', 'shared clarity' and discovery of 'leading indicators'. Problem solving requires critical thinking and then influencing. It requires understanding patterns and acting on them. Lack of time and resources and other real/perceived pressures leads to impatience with communication gaps which in turn leads to loss of effectiveness.

So forget how you want to say it, focus on what the audience is looking for. Use their vocabulary and frames of reference. It does not mean you need to give up your beliefs or values, just change the way the point is made.

360 degree view

It would be nice to know everything about the problem before starting solution.

The imperfections of this world prevent us from getting a 360 degree view of a problem or situation can be classified as:

• Unknown: You don't know the information today, but given time and resources you can know it.
• Unaffordable: You don't have the time or resources to get the information now or you would have to agree to terms and conditions that make it pointless to proceed.
  
• Unknowable: The capabilities to understand or explain the situation or incident are not in place and we are not sure when those capabilities will be available.
  
• Unlawful: Sometimes having and acting on some types of information is illegal (e.g. insider information)
  

In the meantime, we have a strategy to execute. To avoid paralysis, try answering the following questions:

• How much do you know?
• How reliable is the information?
• What is the deadline to act? (can the deadline be moved?)
• What is the cost of not taking a decision?
  
• How much can the decision be postponed? (to buy time to get more information)
• What is your comfort and risk taking ability? (how much can you afford to lose?)
  
• What do you really care about? (outcomes)

Build a 360 degree view over time for outcomes that you really care about.

Linkages

Executing strategy is a matter of finding, building, inventing and leveraging linkages.

In Six Sigma linkages are known as the 'cause-effect' relationships. You define the problem (the difference between desired and actual) and then try to find out the root causes. If you can find and control the causes, the effect can be controlled too. It is not so simple of course, it sometimes takes a lot of work, research and statistical analysis.

In executing your strategy, the equivalent exercise is getting the 'line of sight' from capability to customer outcome. A supporting activity is to thread the initiatives, projects and deliverables so that they work together in an integrated fashion to produce synergy in building capabilities. Capabilities that are integrated are more powerful than capabilities that are silo'ed.

In the absence of linkages, a 'translation' has to occur as capabilities interact with each other. This translation increases friction, increasing the cycle time and expense to deliver customer outcomes.

Communication gaps

It is helpful to know the difference between 'understand' and 'agree'.

If you and the other person don't understand each other, make assumptions and proceed down a path of defending ideas, communication gaps are inevitable. A sure symptom of a lack of understanding is dissonance within yourself or the other person. Something does not 'feel right'. Telling someone they 'don't understand' seems to create more communication gaps. Skillful conversations and emotions management is needed. The process to reach a common understanding is non-linear and situation based, so if you have trouble with the 'process', start there.

Once a common understanding is reached, turn your attention to 'agreement'. This is usually easier to obtain. At the very least people can 'agree to disagree'. This works provided the areas of disagreement are clearly spelled out. If there are genuine reasons for disagreement, work on the 'reasons', then get back to the 'agreement'.

With increase in complexity, diversity and requirements for tolerance, communication gaps may be getting harder and harder to resolve. Knowing that complexity, diversity and requirements for tolerance will only keep increasing, what is your plan to bridge communication gaps?

Dysfunctional generalities

In trying to analyze complex scenarios or propose solutions, clear thinking and suspending judgment is required. Consider the following:

• Look for the use of "should" and "should not." These usually result in 'moralizing' and 'put downs'. Set, define or propose goals that are tangible (use the SMART format).
  
• "We need to think this thru." Replace with observations of what did not work and call for a meeting of stakeholders to further brainstorm and generate proposals.
• Use of the words "always" and "never." List what's 'in' and what's 'out'. List what it 'is' and what it 'is not'.
• Claims that cannot be substantiated. If it is a hunch, say so. Nothing wrong in making educated guesses.
  
• Events that cannot be reproduced. Acknowledge that it might be a freak event, something to look out for.
  
• Boundary conditions and exceptions. Treat them for what they are.
  

What examples have you seen of dysfunctional generalities?

Baby steps

When in doubt, take baby steps. Direction does not matter, since the steps are small its easy to course correct. Not moving is not learning. Not moving is not building strength and confidence. True for babies, true for strategy execution.

Don't walk before you can run is an extension of the above paradigm. The speed of moving from running to walking is a function of risk taking ability and the ability to learn from mistakes. In addition, there is the capability (coordination and strength) of the limbs and mind to be considered.

This is why a roadmap is needed to execute strategy. There may be debate and dialogue around what features to put out in what release. Some may say the roadmap is too aggressive, others may complain things are moving too slow. Its all a matter of iterating till you find the right pace.

Iterating may be done thru trial and error. A more structured way is to study the culture of the organization or team to understand the 'soft' capacity to execute.

Recognizing a problem

A problem is defined here as the difference between 'desired' and 'actual'.

If your audience does not recognize a problem exists, don't try to solve it. Try to figure out why they do not think a problem exists when you are absolutely convinced that it does.

If the audience agrees a problem exists, then they will use their prioritization to determine whether it is worth solving now, later or never.

If it is worth solving now, the question arises whether your solution is the most appropriate. If it is worth solving later, look for the drivers of 'timing' and monitor the audience readiness. If the problem is not worth solving 'ever', then leave it alone. When the pain is unbearable, the audience will change its mind.

What's true for the audience is true for you too. You have to select from the vast array of opportunities and focus your energies to get maximum returns.

Pointing out opportunities without alienating the audience is an art form. Its often less about the facts, more about the emotions.

Energizing teams and talent

When working with diversity, its frustrating to deal with teams and people who are at different levels. Those who 'know more' are scornful of those who 'know less'. Those who 'know less' keep insisting they have value to add and don't feel appreciated. Those who have acquired tribal knowledge over years of pain work to use it to consolidate their power and further their agenda.

To perform leadership roles in an environment where skill and competencies are not equally distributed, you may do well to learn from Dreyfus and Dreyfus (see their book 'Mind Over Machine..'). Per this model, there are 5 levels of progression:

1. Novice
2. Advanced Beginner
3. Competent
4. Proficient
5. Expert

There is a lot to learn on this subject, we will restrict this blog entry to a couple of key takeaways: Novices cannot learn from Experts, we know that intuitively but this framework helps explain why. Adjacent skill levels should be paired up to gain maximum synergy in competency development. Identify competencies needed based on the strategic need of an organization, initiative or project. Then apply the model. No one is a 'novice' per se, just novice in a competency.

To execute your strategy, establish learning plans and incentives to take the organization, teams and individuals from novice to expert in relevant competencies a systematic manner. Of course, you could always 'hire' instead of 'build'. If you 'hire' make sure you have enough people in each stage so that the newly hired 'expert' does not get rejected 'culturally' because there were not enough people in adjacent levels.

Dealing with ambiguity

In one of my earlier posts I had said that ambiguity is going to increase, not decrease. This continues to be true.

Most leaders have the following guidance to their follows: "Deal with it." This advice is a reflection of an abdication of leadership responsibilities. It is also a sign that they are clueless of how to deal with it. To be fair, in a small percentage of cases, they may be challenging their audience to rise to the occasion.

Leaders can take some concrete steps to deal with ambiguity:

• One, acknowledge it exists. This will immediately calm people down. When people think the other person has clarity and they don't, it really bothers them and leads to stress.
• Two, describe the ambiguity. Knowing why there is ambiguity actually helps to know the root cause. If if the problem is unsolvable or unknowable, there is a certain comfort in knowing that your worry is legitimate. In a peculiar sort of way, this reduces the worry for some.
• Three, ask for proposals. Don't ask for suggestions. The difference is, if someone makes a 'proposal' and you accept it, they get to follow thru execute. If they make a 'suggestion' and you accept it, someone else has to execute. I split hairs here to make an important point.
• Four, point out the opportunity for creativity and collaboration. If people start talking to each other, the fog may lift earlier than later.
• Five, be very careful not to judge people in this period. Judgment is a reflection of poor leadership and a sign of a leader's insecurity in general, this just aggravates the situation if displayed in ambiguous situations.
• Six, don't ask people to 'take initiative' and 'do something'. They will even if you don't ask them to. Problem is, they will try to help, but make things worse. Alignment to customer outcomes and priorities, coordination and timing is crucial.
• Seven, create a plan. Most teams freeze in their tracks and are unable to plan. Ironically, this is when they need planning the most.

Its not going to be perfect during periods of ambiguity. Duplication of effort, confusion, frustration and drop in trust have to be identified and dealt with.

3 distinct concepts

In executing your strategy, there are 3 distinct concepts to consider. These are often used interchangeably, so a clarification is in order:

• Business savvy: If you have this you have a keen understanding of business models (how is money made?) and problem solving.
• Leadership: If you display leadership behaviors you can prevent and resolve conflicts, influence your audience and look/behave/speak/smell like you are in charge.
• Decision making: This is the spark that starts the fire. The best ideas, the most detailed plans, the intentions and vision are all for naught if no action is taken. Decisions are the ignition to action.

Each of the above areas is a distinct competence and often go together. Usually people with business savvy are good decision makers as well. Leaders are often business savvy, they know how to get things done and what ideas will work.

If business savvy is missing, you will lose money. If leadership is missing, your ideas will not be accepted. If decision making is missing, inertia and rigor mortis sets in.

One way to deal with complexity

Suspend judgment.

When faced by complexity, there are good chances that you will encounter ideas that you do not understand or you do not agree with. The complexity also makes it harder to find cause and effect relationships, hence solutions are not easy to develop. We are forced to collaborate with people to piece together the puzzle. Given that people have different frames of reference, use language differently, are at different skill levels, you can begin to see why diversity is a double edged weapon. Heck, its like putting together a jigsaw puzzle without the final picture!

Judgment is a defense mechanism that appears when emotional awareness is low. Think of people who are judgmental as 'leaders in training'. It is a sign that you do not understand the issues on the table. It is a sign that the other person does not understand your point of view.

Yes, there is more to dealing with complexity, suspending judgment is not enough. But its a good starting point.

Abundance mentality

This is not a new concept and certainly not my idea.

The abundance mentality implies there is plenty for all. Everyone can get what they want without having to deprive anyone else of their desires. One way to achieve abundance is to increase the size of the pie. This requires high self-esteem and creativity.

The scarcity mentality on the other hand focuses on dividing the pie. This automatically assures that to get more, someone else needs to get less. A scarcity mentality is a sure recipe for conflict and frustration.

Strategy execution requires stakeholders to give and take. Strong facilitation and leadership is required to focus teams on the abundance mentality. A scarcity mentality results is dysfunctional politics and turf battles.

Thermometers versus thermostats

The difference between the two is critical:

• A thermometer is a proxy to the temperature in a room. A thermometer will not tell you whether its too hot or too cold, in other words, no value judgments. It will simply tell you the temperature.
  
• Thermostats take action based on business rules. If the temperature falls below a certain amount, the thermostat causes the heater to kick in to warm the room. If the temperature rises above a certain amount, the thermostat causes the air conditioner to kick in to cool the room.

In executing your strategy, you need both. Thermostats need a thermometer to be effective. Without a thermostat, a thermometer is useless.

As an example, business analytics and business intelligence reports are no use unless you can tie them to action.

Anticipation

Sometimes you can't.

Every time you catch yourself saying, "I should have thought of that" or "Why did I not think of that before?" you are reflecting on your (lack of) anticipation.

A more dysfunctional way is to ask, "Why the heck did you not think of this before?" This is the notion of carrying accountability to an extreme. Punitive questioning results in defensive behavior and reduced risk taking.

While there are consequences for not being able to anticipate, sometimes the only thing that can be done is to learn from the experience and improve the planning process.

Effective strategy execution requires improved planning, which in turn requires an ability to anticipate. 'Guessing' is not anticipating. For complex situations, experience from multiple people may have to be pooled together, while guarding against 'groupthink'.

FUD: Sand in the gears of strategy execution

In a fast moving, dynamic execution environment, it is hard to keep everyone up to date on what is going on. The answer is not to slow down but to look for the symptoms caused by the pace of execution.

Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt. These are symptoms. Look for the root cause:

• Lack of identity, hence leadership is unable to provide clarity.
• Leadership does not think its important to provide clarity.
• Expectations are implicit and not explicit, people make it up as they go along.
• Low self-esteem and self-confidence leading to a need to be appreciated being greater than the need to focus on execution.
• Your reason here.

If the leadership (defined as the person in charge) is frustrated and cannot control its frustration, FUD will continue and grow. Time to look for new leadership.

Is this 'good' customer service? Part 2

Please read the earlier blog by this title to get the background.

So I get the coupon in the mail. Pleased that they took the time to send me the coupon, I almost forgot about it. (An issue with coupons and rebates: they provide comfort to customers, but no real value when they are not used)

Today, I decided to redeem my coupon for a "free 2-liter or 1-liter product" made by the company. I was briefly puzzled by why they would offer me a "free 2-liter or 1-liter product" instead of saying "up to 2 liters", but I quickly shrugged it off. Only so many problems I can solve, right?

After mulling over the range of products offered by the company, I grab a 2-liter bottle, head to the check out counter, where I was informed that the coupon had a value of $1.49 and that the product I selected was $1.89. To buy the product, I would have to pay an extra 40 cents.

The price and currency are irrelevant, the point being, I got a coupon that said "free", then put a limit to what I could get as "free."

I left the store without making a purchase, but my head was buzzing with the following thoughts:

• Where in the company's strategy execution did the process break down? Did anyone know that "free" and a limit of $1.49 sounded contradictory?
• These people were not stupid, but I was stumped. What could be the rationale?
• What could they do differently to catch this scenario?
  

This led me to think of another situation, this time with a well known online retail store. They offer free shipping on qualifying orders totaling $25 or more. However, many lower priced items top off at $24.99. This forces me to either buy an additional product or wait till I wanted another item. Its a brilliant strategy, designed to increase sales no doubt, but also a brilliant way to really annoy customers. If they had to make their customers buy more than 25 dollars worth, at least don't bring them tantalizingly close to that total.

I am sure pricing is very complex to design, but what do I care? I am the customer and I am always right!

Right?

"Time saved" as a business value justification

I am curious about the business value justification using "time saved." For example, if I do a project that saved one hour per person, each gets paid $100 per hour and there are 5,000 employees in the organization, I have just saved the organization $500,000. Right?

How much of that money do I see in cash? None. You are not going to ask employees to return that money to the organization. That's because you can't!

The real saving is realized if the time saved is spent on doing something that has a tangible return higher than the money saved. Lets say the time is reinvested in revenue generating activity that earns or saves hard cash of say, $150 per employee, then we have saved $250,000. (The gain is $50 per hour per employee)

The above is an example of saving effort (doing more with the same or doing same with less). What if an output is available faster? Instead of taking 10 days, what if you got the output in, say, 6 days? What is the value of reduced cycle time? For example, if I get book quicker when buying online, but I can't or don't read it for another month, then what did I gain from the faster delivery? Sometimes its just gratification (a subjective measure).

Because these computations are complex and sometimes the value of initiatives such as the Special Olympics cannot be quantified in money terms. In yet other cases, programs and projects are undertaken to reduce anxieties of customers, stakeholders and executives. The value case is complex to compute, yet it exists. Just because its hard to find does not mean it does not exist.

All the following are valid business justifications:

• Avoiding a problem
• Getting rid of a problem
• Preventing a problem

Be in the moment, focus on what is considered 'value' and go with the flow. If you have a strong opinion, use your influencing and leadership skills. Know when to cut your losses and when to tactically withdraw in the face of insurmountable irrationality to your definition of a business justification.

Transitions

Strategy execution is not a 'project' that runs uninterrupted from start to finish. (Very few projects run uninterrupted from start to finish, but that is a topic for a different blog)

Strategy execution involves one or more of the following transitions:

• Market transitions: Innovation and competition cause organizations to re-evaluate how they are working with customers. Shortage of resources cause a shift in consumption and lifestyle, creating new opportunities as old ones are destroyed.
  
• Organization transitions: As a response to market transitions, organizations change their structure and processes in order to deliver value to customers faster, cheaper and better.
  
• Acquisitions: Companies acquire or are acquired in the hope of improving and sustaining their competitive advantage.
  
• Personal growth and evolution: Individuals evolve, mature, move up Maslow's hierarchy resulting in changes in what drives them.

Anticipating and recognizing the need for a transition is a core competence required for strategy execution. Making a transition happen, planning for one and change management are other competencies that are required for agility in strategy execution.

Art, science, witchcraft

All 3 tend to get used in executing strategy.

• Science is the easiest to describe and explain. This includes application of learnings from books, research, models, articles, training and best practices. Techniques such as Six Sigma and Monte Carlo simulation will provide a structure the problem/opportunity like you would not believe. Those who don't understand the science will turn to the other two (see below).
  
• Art is when you can apply science to a specific situation. Clumsy application gives science a bad name. Proper application makes science look irrelevant. This is all the tribal knowledge gained through experience and instinct driven actions that are hard to explain. It points to why those who are successful using 'art' have so little patience with those advocating 'science'.
  
• Witchcraft is when you either get lucky or do borderline immoral and illegal things to get your way. Distorting and manipulating facts, withholding information, sacrificing long term stability for short term gains all fall in this area. Its called 'witchcraft' because these actions are well concealed (for a good reason) and are discovered by accident. People practicing witchcraft eventually get caught and pay the price, but in the short term there is a price to pay for their misdeeds (lost morale, lowered trust, lost productivity and talent turnover).

The worst thing to do is judge which ones are 'right' and 'wrong' or 'good' and 'bad'. Decide what the organization needs and line up incentives and dis-incentives. Behavior modification will follow as a matter of course.

Importance of a clear Value Proposition

If you walk up to someone and say, "I have a solution that will help you:

• Get rich.
• Lose weight.
• Sleep well.

All without side effects or unintended consequences", you will get their attention immediately. Yes, they will want to know more, want proof, testimonials, guarantees and warranties. But at this time, their attention is all yours and they will give you permission to tell your story because your value proposition is simple and clear.

In strategy execution, people and teams have to change: they have to stop doing what they doing, start doing something different, very few things will stay the same. One of the best way to get their attention before you get permission to tell your story is via a clear value proposition.

Trust and value

I dread the thought of taking my car for service. The customer service rep rattles off a list of things wrong with the car and presents a huge bill. At this moment, I begin to wonder if it is cheaper to just buy a new car.

When I push back on the list, citing affordability, the service rep indicates a priority of what is critical and what can wait. This leads me to wonder how much my loyalty would have gone up for the service center if he had offered this information without being asked. (I was going to say respect, but that is a useless emotion. Respect cannot be directly monetized, but loyalty can. If you have a different perspective, I look forward to hearing it)

After the service is complete, I get a call, telling me they found a few other defects and try to up sell and cross sell. When I push back, they retreat, but ominously point out the documentation on the invoice, as if to say, "You have been warned."

If you take the emotion out of the transaction, the lowered trust is from my utter lack of knowledge of how a car work and lack of interest in learning how a car works. The auto service shop is in the business of fixing cars, not education. However, since I am the customer, I still expect the auto shop to do something to set my mind at ease and earn my trust.

Question is, what can they do? They don't want to educate me, just to see me walk out and get the repairs done by a different auto shop, after I get a second opinion. Providing education is a distraction that takes attention away from their core competence of repairing cars.

This is a common situation in strategy execution. Customer or stakeholder don't understand the complexity, they don't want to, but they expect their needs to be met and exceeded.

In this case, maybe the auto service shops can get together to form an association and spread the cost of education customers over all members. This would lead in increased credibility for the industry, leaving each auto service shop with no overhead of the education required to earn trust. They can then focus on the core of their business to provide customer delight.

Use case vs. Value case

Use cases describe how a system behaves and responds from an outsider's point of view. This could be a user or customer.

A use case creates the notion of a scenario. If all possible scenarios experienced by a user or customer are identified, the system can create responses to reduce cost and cycle times for responses. If the scenarios occur over and over again, a programmed response is possible, if not, then a one-off response is required.

Programmed responses reduce costs and cycle time, but make it more impersonal. One-off responses can be highly personalized, but may take time and be expensive.

The 'value case' is the business benefit of an investment. It can be tangible: reduce complaints, do things faster, better, cheaper, sell more, up sell, cross sell, repeat sales to same customer, customers return less, risk reduction, cost avoidance, high MTBF and low MTTR. Or intangible: word of mouth, referrals, building the brand awareness, permission from customers to talk to them, positive halo effect, brownie points with a community.

Sometimes an investment has to be made to keep stakeholders or the boss happy, with no line of sight to the customer. This is a cost of doing business. Removing barriers and gaining sponsorship is the cost of doing business. If it has to be done, evaluate it as an investment. In executing your strategy, keeping someone happy need not be an emotional decision.

Package versus ingredients

In achieving excellence, many things have to come together, fit seamlessly and work without friction.

Distinguish between 'ingredients', which we define as one of the pieces of the puzzle that stands alone and provides value in its own right, and 'packages', which we define as a set of ingredients that has value greater than the sum of its parts.

For example, the bullets and the graphics on a slide show are the ingredients. The sequence, the delivery, the pre-sell and authenticity of the speaker combine to make the package.

Technicians take pride in the ingredients, rightly so, they labor hard to fine tune and polish it. When executing your strategy, be sure your team has a few of these. Technicians produce the outputs that are needed to deliver results.

Customer outcomes will be met only when 'packages' are delivered. For example, in selling a product, the price, time to learn, ease of use, ease of buying, ease of upgrades, ease of abandonment all come together to deliver value. In strategy execution, the 'package' has ingredients such as stakeholder management, change management, portfolio management, managing culture, project management and innovation.

Oh yes, a 'package' may be an 'ingredient' to a bigger package...

Feeding hungry guests

When you invite a lot of guests to dinner and the food preparations are behind schedule, tensions begin to rise. Guests get hungrier and crankier. To keep the guests calm and stop them from leaving, appetizers are provided. To keep the guests away from hunger, spread out the appetizers and don't serve it all at once.

What does this have to do with 'Strategy Execution'?

When managing enterprise class programs to execute strategy, the same situation comes up. High stakes increases stress levels, large budgets raise the risk, coalitions of high profile stakeholders have to be built and nurtured, complexity has to be unraveled and lots of dots have to connect. A lot of work has to be done before anything tangible or useful can be produced.

In the meantime, to keep sponsors, stakeholders, partners and team members engaged, send out frequent updates and sound bites. Town halls (less frequent) is a good way to get everyone to meet and greet (even virtual town halls have value).

Avoid leaving anyone in the dark (panic or passivity sets in), celebrate good news (no matter how small) and do not delay sharing the bad news. Radio silence may cause you to lose credibility; you lose momentum, it takes time to get it back and use it to your advantage.

Power of clarity

'Clarity' is the 'aha' moment about the problem or opportunity at hand. Joint clarity is when two or more people understand the problem or opportunity in the same way. You could even talk about clarity around the other person's motivation (an essential ingredient of leadership).

Why bother trying to achieve 'clarity'?

• It saves time. Needless time and expense is spent by individuals and teams 'talking past each other' in an attempt to make themselves understood first.
  
• Avoid frustration. There is a certain peace that descends on people when they 'get it'.
  
• Increases collaboration and teamwork. Now that we understand each other, let us talk about what inputs and outputs we need to exchange!
  
• Increases trust. Clarity makes it easy for people to work with each other. This is the emotional component of the interactions.
  
• Conflict management becomes easier. Clarity reduces the need to argue and fight and fosters an abundance mentality.
  

The first step in achieving clarity is to say "I don't understand." If you think you understand, try summarizing your point of view about the other person's point of view. This will confirm/validate your understanding and prepare you to receive the above benefits.

Decoding feedback

If people said what they meant and meant what they said, life would be simpler (and some would argue, more boring).

The barriers to communication have been well documented:

• Language usage and interpretation
• Personal decision biases
• Differing frames of references driven by values and beliefs
• Defensive behaviors
  
• (Put your reason here)
  

This makes 'feedback' sound like a 'complaint' or a 'threat' or even a 'personal attack'. It takes great skill, self control and discipline to remove the emotions out of the situation and focus on the message. Leadership lies in displaying compassion for the messenger, who may be upset or frustrated and even in a destructive mood.

Yes, easier said than done, but the alternatives seem to escalate conflict not resolve it.

Early warning systems

The other day, a light went on in my auto's dashboard, warning me that tire pressure was low. Fortunately, I was near a car service station. An inspection revealed the culprit, a nail in the tire.

60 minutes and $29 later, I had a tire all ready for the travails of transportation.

Imagine me hurtling down the highway without knowing about the nail in the tire, unknowingly putting lives and property at peril! Not to mention the loss in productivity because a pile up brought traffic to a halt. The warning light and my acting on the light prevented a tragedy. Just the light alone would have achieved nothing.

There are many aspects of your strategy execution that will benefit from having and acting on warning lights. Out of the infinite warning lights that are possible, you have to select the ones that matter (use the 80:20 rule, align with customer outcomes and definition of success). Build the capabilities to display the light (this is so hard to do sometimes that it is often not done) and educate stakeholders/teammates on the appropriate action to take when the light shows a specific color (yes, history has shown that warning signs are ignored!).

Six Sigma calls these 'leading indicators'. The first step is to define the problem/opportunity and then build the capability. This is one of the areas where 'build it and people will use it' is expensive and frustrating.

Settling disputes

From time to time, teams will get into conflict situations. Arbitrators will quickly recognize the issue as a 'communication gap', but the parties involved in the conflict will be overcome by their emotion and defensiveness to listen to reason.

Try this technique to take the emotion out of the conversation. Focus on deliverable (inputs and outputs) that need to be exchanged between the parties. There are good chances that the producer and consumer of the deliverable have a different understanding of the requirements. One of the parties may be having trouble explaining to the other as to why the deliverable is not acceptable.

By staying focused on the deliverable requirements and how the 'actual' varies from 'desired', the conversation can come back on track. Use patience and compassion to earn brownie points, respect and cooperation. Improve your communication skills to accurately describe the requirement, removing all emotion.

Beware the 'sound byte'

Mark Twain described sound bites as "a minimum of sound to a maximum of sense."

Sound bites (yes, apparently 'sound byte' is an incorrect usage) can be very useful to communicate the essence of a topic, problem, opportunity or issue on hand. Used well, eyes will light up and the room will reverberate to the sound of "I got it!".

Sound bites are the modern version of the dagger carried by the assassins in the days or yore. Daggers were handy to take down people who were getting too powerful, annoying, inconvenient, threatening or difficult to understand. Sometimes, daggers were used just for amusement. Over time humans became more civilized and realized that killing opponents is not a solution that will scale. Besides, law enforcement was getting better and one day, they might be killed themselves!

Enter the 'sound bite'. A few well placed bites can plant seeds of doubt to raise questions on credibility of a person, a solution, a proposal, intentions, actions or plans.

It is often debated whether humans have fundamentally evolved and become more civilized or whether they are the same. Whatever the answer, deal with reality. In executing your strategy, use 'sound bites' or be used by it.

Friction pays!

In the course of executing your strategy you will encounter obstacles, frustration and delays.

Remember the saying, 'Necessity is the mother of invention'? Problems drive discovery/invention of solutions. Problems drive the need for creativity. Without problems, there will be very little need for us to do anything meaningful.

Therefore, rejoice upon seeing problems. Problems are a reason to employ you, they are paying your bills and has potential for greater things, like immortality.

If you experience frustration, disappointment or dejection, treat that as a problem to be solved in itself. Turn to leadership principles to find the courage to deal with obstacles and to inspire others.

Why it 'stinks'

Its why we need to take a shower every now and then.
Its why we need a haircut periodically.
Its why we need to clip our nails from time to time.
Its why we need to refill the gas tank after driving.
Its why the dishes need to be washed.

In executing your strategy, there are many tasks and activities that fall in the 'hygiene' category. They require constant attention and nourishment. If you don't give them attention, bad things start to happen. Relationships need more maintenance than we estimate or desire. The non-relationship based tasks can potentially be controlled.

Creative solutions are required. Hire an admin assistant, delegate better. Proactively schedule 'maintenance' activities. Automate what you can.

If you feel frazzled and stressed and feel like you are hunting ants not elephants, look to see how well you are managing these types of activities.

Everything is interconnected: use this fact to your advantage in creating plans

This is an analogy familiar to software programmers. Code that refers to data that does not exist produces software crashes. The whole science of software engineering has spent a lot of effort on creative solutions to prevent such code from being written.

Humans also experience 'crashes' when executing their strategy. A couple of examples: (i) A process requires an input, but there is no clarity or agreement on who will provide that output. (ii) A process generates an output, but there is no clarity or agreement on who will consume that output.

Humans can tolerate ambiguity better than machines, they do this by asking questions and collaborating. When they can't or won't, dysfunctional behavior is generated.

When creating a plan make sure everything is connected to everything else. After the plan is created, it has to be tracked. A good plan that connects all the dots will make tracking status easier. The final challenge is to present the plan. Too much detail may result in the important items not getting the desired attention. Different stakeholders have different needs, so the presentation has to be targeted to their needs. Communication becomes easier when the dots can be connected in a meaningful and relevant way.

Everything is connected to everything else. Find the connection to create, track and communicate your plans to execute strategy.

Scoring points in meetings

Meetings are expensive. Consider the following costs:

• Salary and benefits paid to attendees
• Infrastructure: phone bill, video conferencing costs, rent etc.
• Other costs: lunch, drinks etc.
  

If meetings do not have clear agendas (is it to take a decision? deep dive on a topic? build relationships?) participants will be guarded in their interactions. In addition to clear agendas, the roles and responsibilities of attendees needs to be clear (why are they here? to learn? to share knowledge? to help connect the dots?).

If agendas and roles are are unclear, almost as if to amuse themselves, the participants will use the meetings to 'score points'. After all, who wants to look clueless in a meeting with their superiors and peers! If allowed to continue, trust is lowered and coalitions for future projects will be harder to build.

Look for meetings where more time is being spent in 'scoring points' than in productive discussions. Terminate the meeting swiftly and reconvene when outcomes are clearly defined.

Is this 'good' customer service?

This is a true story.

On a hot day, I put money into a vending machine to get a drink. The machine accepted my money, but no product was dispensed. As I was thinking about what to do next, I noticed an 800 number to call for 'customer service and complaints'.

Curious to see how they would respond, I called the number and was greeted by a very polite voice that sincerely apologized and offered to send me a coupon to cover me for my loss. After taking down my name and address, the voice again apologized for the inconvenience and hung up.

But the voice did not ask for the location of the vending machine!

I will eventually get the coupon in the mail, but two problems still remained:

• The company will continue to pile up unhappy customers. Until the problem is fixed, customers will continue to insert cash and not get a drink. Since the company had no idea where the broken vending machine is, who knows when the problem will be fixed!
• I was still thirsty and still had to figure out how to get a drink.

How badly does your organization's strategy execution misfire due to the lack of a simple closed loop process? How many opportunities for innovation are being missed because these incidents are not tracked and analyzed? Is your organization being blindsided by having a visible process that looks good but does not really fix the problem?

Organizational Politics

"A reflection of the complexity in reconciling multiple perspectives and interests in the face of imperfect information and human emotions."

Do not make a presentation until you answer these two questions

The two questions your audience will ask are:

• "So what?"

Answering this prevents analysis paralysis, draws attention to cause-effect relationships and help you start with the end in mind. If done properly, this may lead you to nix proposals that make no business sense.

• "What's in it for me?"

Answering this will shift the focus from you to your customer. You will define benefits and outcomes from your customer's viewpoint. In other words, you will stop staring at your belly button when defining and executing your strategy.

Why is it so hard to focus on outcomes?

A plea to 'start with the end in mind' falls on deaf ears. The organization is consumed by activities, projects and initiatives and yet customer satisfaction seems to be dropping. This happens when outcomes are not clearly defined.

Some people are inherently afraid to commit. This is a symptom, not the real problem. Unless the real problem and its root causes are addressed, people will continue to be afraid to commit.

Consider these reasons:

• A dynamic environment means change and adaption. As soon as a stand is taken, a goal is set, it seems to get obsolete. Therefore, the thought enters the mind, 'Why bother?'.
• A fear of 'closing one's options' and 'leaving money on the table'. The number of variables to be evaluated are typically infinite. In a desire to maximize gains, the analysis continues even when the returns on doing so is diminishing.
  

Accept the reality of a dynamic environment. Customer outcomes provide a degree of stability that provide a beacon in the face of dynamic uncertainty. Shift focus to outcomes to derive goals and objectives. Bound the analysis effort with discipline, approach opportunities as a continuous improvement effort.

Consider these additional reasons:

• Fear of failure: Because you never described what you aiming for, you never really 'missed', right? If something 'failed' its 'not your fault'.
• Fear of success: This is a latent fear, hence most people are unaware it exists. Success will bring additional responsibilities, risk and higher stakes. Having 'More to lose' sometimes results in defensive behavior.
  

These relate to self-confidence, esteem and values. At the organization level, start by looking at systems to provide feedback and incentives. At the individual level, deeper introspection and attention needs to be given to influence these psychological factors.

Flying blind

If you ever feel like you are driving thru a fog, with low visibility, you probably are. Its the nagging feeling of not knowing what to expect and the sick feeling that something bad is imminent.

If that happens, then your intuition is probably right.

Prevent the situation from arising by building a strong intelligence network to get early warnings. If it does happen, carefully and selectively investigate to piece together the story; and coherently define the situation. You will be surprised how many people around you are in the same boat and reacting like one of the blind men trying to describe an elephant by feeling parts of it with their hands.

If you can't take off your blindfold, yes, sometimes that is hard to do, at least make sure you systematically try to feel multiple parts of the elephant before drawing conclusions.

What is the definition of 'done'?

All tasks have upstream and downstream connections. They are part of a 'value stream'.

To get the definition of 'done', pick your 'start' and 'end' points. Negotiate with your stakeholders so they are clear where your boundaries are. Adjust your boundaries in response to changes in context.

The definition of 'done' is crucial for hand offs. Receive outputs from upstream processes when they are 'done', this will avoid delays, rework and frustration on your part. Pass your output to downstream processes only when you are 'done', this will increase your credibility and influence. The downstream processes are in a sense, your customer.

A definition of 'done' will avoid the loss of credibility by celebrating bigger than warranted. It will prevent the loss of morale by not celebrating enough.

A definition of 'done' is the target that everyone is aiming for, the clearer the target, the higher the chances of hitting it in a predictable and repeatable manner.

Tolerance for variance

'Variance' is the difference between desired and actual. If you know the customer's tolerance for variance, you can fine tune your offering to provide it in a cost effective manner.

To get the product or service out to the customer, internal processes and handoffs have to occur. The people who work on these internal processes and handoffs have their own tolerance requirements. This is a function of company and personal values and more often, a reflection of their personal preferences. (We'll debate the difference between 'value' and 'preference' elsewhere!)

Internal conflicts are caused when these tolerances are not met. Hence the need to negotiate and agree on rules of engagement.

In your chosen field of Strategy Execution, what is the tolerance for variance? How much of that has to be re-caliberated?

Committed versus involved

An example recycled many times over, funny when delivered with the right timing.

"In creating the content for breakfast, the pig is committed (bacon) whereas the hen is involved (egg)."

When building a team to execute strategy, whom would you rather have, the 'committed' or the 'involved'?

How many of each type of people do you have on your team today?

Check a version of this story here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Chicken_and_the_Pig

When faced by ambiguity...

Have you sat in meetings where the discussion is all over the place? This is not always a skill issue. After all, there is enough knowledge on how to run an effective meeting and principles of facilitation is a well documented science.

Non-linear, unstructured churn is a sign of people struggling with ambiguity. To get past the churn, two things need to happen:

• The participants comfort and self-confidence with the topic needs to increase
• The participants knowledge of the topic needs to increase
  

These two build on each other to clear the fog of ambiguity. To hasten the process, develop an entrepreneurial mind set.

Since the world is only going to become more complex, ambiguity will keep increasing. This implies that improvement in strategy execution practices requires us to become entrepreneurs when faced by ambiguity. Said differently, we must become comfortable with ambiguity to become an entrepreneur.

Being an entrepreneur is a state of mind, not restricted to those who start a business.

What and when to celebrate

When executing strategy, the road often seems long and the weary don't get enough rest. To keep the team morale up, celebrate successes.

The first question is what to celebrate? First understand two anchor points:

• Where you were at the 'start'.
  
• Where we want to be at the 'end'.
  

Compare your current location and decide if you want to celebrate the distance you covered from the 'start' or celebrate progress towards the 'end'. Each has a time and place, which leads us to the question of when to celebrate?

Celebrate before the team needs it. If you celebrate when the team needs it, they will associate celebration with their darkest hours. They will soon enough see the lack of authenticity.

Remember that celebration is an opportunity to send a message about what is important to the organization. It has a purpose much more than to just make the troops 'feel good'.

The right level of detail

When using a geographic map, we instinctively zoom in and out to the 'right level'.

Now imagine the work place if we had that ability in our communication:

• When we have to deliver a message, we will deliver it at the 'right level' for the audience
  
• When receiving a message, we will request the messenger to alter their delivery to the 'right level' so we can understand it faster

If communication is a critical first step to gaining a shared understanding then zooming to the 'right level' is the critical prerequisite.

What is the process?

Want to get things done? First ask, 'What is the process?':

• The steps leading up to taking a decision
• The stakeholders involved
  
• The criteria to approve or decline and
  
• The communication format and channels used to let everyone know the details of the decision.
  

If none exists, then make one up. Now the first step is to get agreement on a decision making process, then the real problem solving can start.

If you start problem solving without nailing down the decision making process, you will experience churn, delays and frustration. And... you will lose bargaining leverage because now you have escalated your commitment and have more vested, financially and emotionally. In simple English, you have more to lose!

Its like giving a customer the price after performing a service...

Overcoming disagreements

You just heard a suggestion. Or someone gave you advice. No matter how ridiculous it was, delay response till you understand the following:

• What is the person really saying? Reflect back and paraphrase as needed.
  
• What are the positives that you can take away?
• Is there anything that was said that you do not understand?
• Will you be able to repeat what was said to you?
  

What will happen if you completely eliminate the notion of 'agree' and 'disagree'? What if those words did not exist?

Then all we will be left with is the outcomes we are trying to reach and the recognition of the need to collaborate in meeting them.

Problems that exist versus problems we create

Many problems (or opportunities) already existed before we were born. Because they are tough complex issues, no one has been able to solve them or a lasting solution has not been found.

For example, political rivalries between countries that sometimes result in war, economic poverty, diminishing resources, economic cycles, pace of change and impact on culture and lifestyle. At a micro level, in an organization, some examples are: incentives to drive drive behavior, lack of capabilities, dysfunctional behavior and poor management practices.

Other problems are created by us when we become part of the system. These are driven by the decisions we take or the decisions we support. The problems grow or shrink due to our actions. Things get worse when unintended consequences are either ignored or suppressed (defensive behavior) or we are completely unaware it happened.

For starters, develop leadership skills by observing and understanding the difference between the above for your situation. This will help you take a stand and communicate and interact appropriately with your audience. It will help you build credibility and coalitions and be a role model.

Above all, avoid becoming part of the problem by becoming cynical about problems you did not create and shirking your responsibility to fix the ones you did create!

Role of 'trust' in executing your strategy

'Trust' is easier to feel than to define. Problems arise when decisions are based on 'trust' without understanding why and without understanding the alternatives.

To effectively execute your strategy, focus on outcomes and define the capabilities you need. Assess the gaps in your capabilities and create a plan keeping your current realities in mind.

When you do not understand the problem, you do not understand the cause and effect relationships and have no idea how to define and implement the solution, then you have nothing else but 'trust' to go on. In such a situation you will depend on 'gut feel' and 'emotion' to take decisions.

You could observe (correctly) that even if all the above are understood, you need to 'trust' yourself, 'trust' your team mates, 'trust' your partners etc. etc. In this situation, your beliefs are based on due diligence. After a certain point, there is no choice but to hope for the best and accept that everything is not in your control.

Know when and why to 'trust'. Blind trust, driven by emotion, has been the downfall of many efforts to execute strategy.

Root cause for complexity

Cause and effect are separated by time and space. Strategy execution is all about getting the desired effect. Understanding and controlling causes are a means to an end.

In some cases the time:space gap between cause and effect is small. For example, if a discount is offered and sales go up, then the cause and effect are clear and very close to each other in time and space.

In other cases the time:space gap is large. 'Complexity' can be defined as the lack of understanding of this time:space gap:

• How big is it?
  
• Why does it exist?
  
• What can we do to control it?
  
• What will it cost to understand and control it?
  
• What are the business benefits of doing so?
• Are there any side effects of changes to the cause-effect relationship?
  

Organizations devote a lot of resources to understanding cause and effect relationships. The biggest benefit is to be able to predict and control the outcomes, not the increased revenue or reduced costs of doing business.

Powerpont versus Reality

You attend a presentation. Slick graphics, concise messaging, soothing speaker.

But something bothers you. It does not feel right. Similar such projects have failed before. This sounds too good to be true. But that is not a reason to withhold your support, so you say 'I agree' to a request to commit, but sit silently, unease increasing.

Then the fog starts to clear. There is a difference between what you heard in the meeting and what is happening in the organization. The emphasis in the meeting was more on building emotional coalition, not real problem solving. The hidden agendas were in plain sight. The elephant in the room had not showered for years but everyone was ignoring the smell because they had got used to the smell!

If you really want to make a difference, show the leadership to first define the problem, then build a coalition of your own. Getting cynical is not the answer. If the problem is worth solving, then go about doing so systematically and methodically. Focus on what you can control: your lack of skills and your unwillingness to confront that reality is contibuting to the problem.

Life is too short to be cynical and negative. If the situation is overwhelming you, find a different job, but don't be surprised if you see history repeat itself. After all, the same problems exist everywhere and you haven't really changed. At the end of the day, you can't run away from yourself.

Two (+1) Anchor Points for Decision Making

Anchor #1: Organizations have a reason for their existence as captured in their vision, mission and goals.

Anchor #2: Organizations consist of people who in turn have their personal vision, mission and goals.

Decisions are typically made in organizations using these two anchor points. Those good at influencing and 'politics' understand both of them.

Appealing to individuals to 'set aside their personal gain and focus on the greater good' is effective only when the individuals share the same value system. Therefore, this leads to the proposition of a third anchor: the value systems subscribed to by the organization and the individuals. Organizations have espoused values. In addition, individuals have values that may not be a total subset of the organization values. The individual values are visible in their behavior and may or may not be consistent with their espoused values.

Decisions that do not exploit all 3 anchor points will take longer to define, take longer to communicate, be disruptive to implement and probably not be effective.

Cultural change is hard because it requires each of the anchor points to move to a new coordinate.

A Third Mountain

In an earlier blog, we reviewed the two mountain waiting to be climbed:

• The first 'Mountain' is for you to understand concepts, problems, issues and solutions.
  
• The next 'Mountain' is to explain your understanding to others

A third mountain exists. It is to let others discover the problem and the solution for themselves. This requires leadership skills to give others the space and demonstrate patience and equanimity.

True learning comes when there is a change in behavior. While time consuming, this change rarely comes without inner realization and motivation to change. 'Explaining' or 'teaching' will work only when motivation is inspired.

Guessing versus Brainstorming

'Brainstorming' is when ideas are generated to discover a solution to a seemingly impossible to solve problem. The rules and guidelines for brainstorming are well documented. Read them and follow them, this is not a good place to reinvent the wheel.

'Guessing' is when you don't know what the heck you are talking about and you are supposed to know the facts. Guessing is a productivity drain, it distracts the team from what is important. It creates anxiety because the problem seems to grow bigger. It is a defensive mechanism used by people and teams who feel a need to protect their egos and ignorance.

First, be a role model and stop guessing. Learn to say 'I don't know'. Next, actively look for 'guessing' and coach those who need to understand the difference between guessing and brainstorming. Do not punish those who don't know and reward those who have the courage to admit it.

When necessary, announce intent to brainstorm so that teams are clear on what is going to happen.

Vagueness as a barrier to executing strategy

Vagueness is different from ambiguity.

We define 'ambiguity' as something that is hard to know. It may be 'unknowable' and we just have to find a way to creatively cope. 'Vague' on the other hand is something that can be known, but is unknown because people do not know how to go about describing it and communicating it.

Some areas where vagueness can be eliminated:

• Knowing who you are. This may be really, really hard to do, but it can be done.
  
• Understanding your job role.
• Describing what you want from the person you are talking to.
• Describing value you have to offer to the person you are talking to.
  
• Identifying barriers that prevent goals from being achieved.
• Describing and prioritizing the capabilities needed to meet customer outcomes.
• Describing what is bothering you about a person or a situation.
• Knowing what you need to stop doing and start doing.
  
• Describing what you want to happen differently.
  

Some areas of ambiguity:

• What the economy will be like tomorrow.
• The real motives that drive human behavior.
• Why wisdom, forgiveness and compassion take time to develop and why some people never acquire them.
• Why we have conflict due diversity in opinion and points of view even after science, philosophy and religion have 'proved' the dynamic unity of the universe.
  

Describing ambiguity is a way to alleviate the stress of dealing with the unknowable.

Dealing with reality is a way to eliminate vagueness. Clarity is achieved when vagueness is eliminated.

Buzzwords

In the next meeting you attend, take notes and underline the 'buzzwords': words, concepts and phrases that could have more than one meaning and therefore open to misinterpretation. Perform the following tasks:

• Underline the words, concepts and phrases you do understand.
• How do you know the others share your understanding of the words, concepts and phrases?
• Underline the words, concepts and phrases you do not understand.
• How will you gain an understanding of those words, concepts and phrases?
• When you observe churn in interactions, locate the words, concepts and phrases that are in the center of the interaction.
• How can the interaction be facilitated to gain a common understanding of words, concepts and phrase?

A starting point in improving communication is to explain and define the buzzwords that are creating barriers.

This is an invisible barrier to executing your strategy. When you bump into it, its hard to see it, hard to define and therefore hard to remove.

Technically, its a barrier to communication, but communication is only a means to an end. Understanding the impact to the end builds a business case to improve the means.

Mountains to climb

Successful Strategy Execution requires you to climb at least two mountains.

The first 'Mountain' is for you to understand:

• What is the problem?
• What are the options?
• What are the barriers?
• What is the optimal solution?
• What are the side effects?
• Why am I doing this?
  

The next 'Mountain' is to explain this to others:

• Those who have the funds (so they can write you a check).
• Those who will do the actual work to help you realize your vision.
• Stakeholders who need to adopt the solution.
• Partners who will provide you the inputs to make your solution work or implement your solution.

Mountain climbing is exhausting. It can be dangerous. Getting to the top is exhilarating. When you get down from the top, there is the next mountain waiting to be climbed. People train for it. Those who approach mountain climbing as a casual, weekend sport quickly give it up. Its too exhausting!

Strategy Execution is not any different.

"The Drive is for the show, the Putt is for the dough"

This phrase is very popular among golfers. The same applies to Strategy Execution also.

Many tasks and activities have low visibility but need to get done. These are in the background, are thankless, tedious, require hard work, but nevertheless, if not done, will hobble strategy execution.

Other tasks and activities seem more visible but less productive. Making presentations, attending meetings and informal hobnobbing with senior executives. No tangible output is apparent, but the wheels of prioritization, budgeting and conflict resolution are turned by such tasks and activities.

Whether it is for the 'show' or for the 'dough', every task and activity must line up with a strategic outcome. That is non-negotiable. Then allocate tasks based on interest, talent, skill and aptitude. Work hard to prevent the creation of a 'brahmin' and 'pariah' classes based on the task or activity.

Windscreen versus Rear View Mirror

Which one is more important? Both of course. Each has a different reason to exist. Do not confuse one with the other.

Analyzing what has happened in the past will tell you only about the past, not about the future. Sometimes, these are called 'lagging indicators'.

Develop the ability to predict. It requires a different set of capabilities. Knowing what happened it the past is one part of it. Additional capabilities are required to predict the future. Sometimes, these are called 'leading indicators'.

Do not fall into the trap of collecting data that is easy to collect (its available, low cost and visible) and ignore data that is important to collect (its usually harder to find, therefore requires additional effort, is harder to explain/justify and therefore looks expensive to collect).

Do'ers versus Talkers

Every organization needs a good mix of 'Line' versus 'Staff'. The 'Line' managers are accountable for getting things done and 'Staff' add value to the efforts of the 'Line' managers.

Think of the 'Line' as the 'Do'ers' and the 'Staff' as the 'Talkers'. This is not to imply that one is better than the other, or that one adds more value than the other. The 'Do'ers' typically have resources to deploy and decision making power. The 'Talkers' have influence and power to guide key organizational processes, such as budget allocations.

If you want to get things done and the meetings are going nowhere, check to see how many 'Do'ers' and how many 'Talkers' are in the audience. If there is more 'talking' than 'doing', then the root cause is clear, take action!

It is easy to hold the 'Do'ers' accountable, their results are typically easier to see and measure. The 'Talkers' will explain how their job is 'harder to measure' therefore 'harder to understand'.

If you cannot define what productivity and excellence looks like for your 'Line' or 'Staff', then your Strategy Execution is going to take longer than it should and chances of not getting it done increases.

How many different ways do I have to say this?

If you find yourself repeating yourself and saying the same thing over and over again without much progress, read on...

Complexity of messaging is directly related to number of stakeholders, partners, internal teams and external customers. If there are no shared values and shared processes, get ready for a long, tedious process of explaining your point of view and understanding their point of view.

Communication is the #1 barrier and #1 facilitator of Strategy Execution. Love it or hate it, but be ready to embrace the demands it places upon you. It comes down to whether you have the aptitude and skill to communicate well. Good news... it can be learnt.

Avoid a 'game face', be authentic and do not be afraid to be vulnerable. Let your actions build trust to lay the foundation for effective communication.

Culture (clash) and Strategy Execution

There is always more than one way to solve a problem. You could debate that a problem could be defined in different ways.

Depending on how many people get involved, infinite choices could be generated for problem definition and solutions, creating churn and frustration. Facilitation is key to narrowing choices and options.

At an individual level, cycle time and specific choices are driven by personal preference which in turn are driven by values, personality and risk taking ability. (This is grossly simplified of course, individual thought processes can be complex)

When individuals work together in groups, a culture develops around their interactions. If there are significant differences in individual's preferences, a culture clash is created. Converge and agree on group decision making processes to prevent culture clashes from becoming personality clashes.

If there is very little difference in individual's preferences, inbreeding and complacency sets in. Introduce diversity to generate divergence needed to address complex problems.

Finding the 'sweet spot' where the culture fosters innovation, creativity and dynamism without degenerating into dysfunction is a key step in executing strategy.

Experience and Strategy Execution risks

When executing strategy, honestly assess the organization on the following:

• Has relevant experience, been there, done that.

• No direct experience, but has experience that can be ported to current situation.

• Has no relevant experience at all.

The risks of executing strategy are inversely related to relevant experience. More the relevant experience, lower the risk and vice versa.

Since an organization is made up of individuals, assess each individual on the above.

Actions and plans will directly reflect the assessment so beware of over-confidence and misplaced optimism.

Where is your focus?

In the past?
In the future?
Or on Right Here, Right Now?

There is a time and place for each. Your portfolio of activities establishes how you manage your time. Not what you say or what you want it to be, but what you DO. Where do you spend most of your time?

Spend time on the past only to learn how to get better or do things differently. Post project reviews are an example (Least time to be spent here).

Spend time on the future only to plan and to anticipate and to prepare contingencies. (Some time to be spent here)

Most of your time should be spent enjoying the moment and just executing your strategy.

Now check your portfolio of 'thoughts'. Where are your thoughts? If they are not Right Here, Right Now all the time, then you need a re-calibration of your thoughts.

Do you see the vision?

For some proposals we make, the destination is clear and we can articulate what we want to say. If we do this well, we are called 'visionaries'.

For other proposals, the destination is unclear, but we have a strong hunch and continue to pursue our dream while struggling to articulate. In such cases, we might be called 'crazy', till such time we can articulate a compelling vision.

If the audience does not agree with the vision or feels our pursuit of it is destructive, we are on a 'crusade'. We all know what happens during crusades. (Hint: people die)

If the audience understands and agree with our vision, then we have true alignment and the wind in our sails.

How can we be self-aware of which of the above is true when we make a proposal?

Now put yourself in the place of the person receiving the proposal and rephrase the above.

Communication: Thinking vs. Doing

A large part of Strategy Execution is getting others to act or not act in certain ways.

The first step is to get on the same page with the audience so that agreements and disagreements are meaningful and relevant.

The next step is to communicate messages so that the audience spends more time on 'acting' versus 'thinking' and 'understanding'. This will happen successfully when the message is simple, relevant and understandable.

If the audience spends more than a certain amount of time 'thinking' and 'understanding' you get churn. Confusion, loss of trust, emotional dysfunction follows. Skilled facilitation and self-control is needed to get past this phase.

Considering the diversity of audiences and the dynamic nature of the environment, mixed with the communicator's style, biases and preferences, this is not easy.

So is communication a journey, not a destination?

Relationship between 'cause' and 'effect'

In solving a problem, do you understand the 'cause-effect' relationships?

Can you draw a fish-bone diagram and accurately quantify the impact of each 'bone' of the fish?

Just because its hard to do does not mean it should not be done. If you think it cannot be done, try anyway. Describe obstacles objectively, ask for help and watch the power of collaboration make the impossible possible.

If you solve a problem without understanding the 'cause-effect' relationships, then you just got lucky. Understanding the 'cause-effect' relationship after solving a problem is better than flying blind into the next problem.

Understanding the 'cause-effect' relationships is table stakes. It may not guarantee future success in addressing similar problems. The Panama Canal could not be built using the lessons learnt from the Suez Canal; it required an understanding of the realities and re-inventing the approach.

When 'Methodologies' meet 'Reality'

Every now and then someone comes along touting a new way to solve problems. However, they fail to clarify what is not solved by their approach. The marketing and PR efforts build a hype and expectations that come crashing down when the methodology meets reality. The downfall is caused not by the core proposition, but typically by the boundary conditions that it fails to meet.

When evaluating a technique/methodology, here are some questions to ask:

• Is the underlying logic and assumptions sound? Or does it have flaws or defects in logic and assumptions?
  
• Does it provide a complete coverage of the problem space? Or are there exceptions to the rule?
  
• How does it address difficulties in implementing the technique due to lack of data or problems that are hard to measure?
• How does it address the 'intangibles' (for example, culture)?
  
• How can sloppy use of the technique by incompetent managers be prevented?

Look for a technique or methodology that will:

• Adapt to your organization, instead of requiring your organization to adapt to it
  
• Build your capacity to execute strategy
  
• Avoid dependence on outside consultants in areas that are core to your business (outsourcing and partnerships are typically for 'context' work)
• Evolve with your needs
• Give you an immediate solution, with a road map to evolve to the next level
  

Poor leadership = Dysfunctional culture = Failures in Strategy Execution

A recent article published in a mainstream newspaper talks about the failure of a developing country's president to inspire and motivate. In fact, this president's abrasive behavior has alienated both friends and foes. (You may wonder how the foes were 'alienated'... but that's besides the point) A reluctance to deal with him directly has shrunk his adviser base and reduced his effectiveness. It is safe to predict that his days in power are probably numbered.

Strategy Execution is not just about market share, innovation, EPS and cost control. Its also about quality of life. An increased governance on toxic behavior may unleash productivity and creativity to take people closer to reaching their potential. This will directly translate into abundance for all.

Toxic and abusive behavior is being tolerated over and over again in organizations all over the world. Toxic behavior has been researched and their negative impacts well documented, yet there seems to be a reluctance to address it directly and effectively.

This reluctance may be a function of leaders not knowing how to control toxic behavior and not having the courage to admit it and ask for help. I think it may be a case of 'learned helplessness'.

What does strategy execution have to do with caring for horses?

If you were caring for a horse, and had to clean the horse manure, which side of the horse do you need to focus on?

Both of course.

What the horse eats determines what comes out the other end. Therefore, if shoveling seems like a lot of work, check to see what you are feeding the horse.

In strategy execution, go as much upstream as you possibly can. Most initial project definitions address downstream problems, these are really symptoms created by decisions taken way up in the process. Sometimes there are real limitations to how much upstream you can go. Keep trying anyway. Its not a perfect world and that is why big, hairy projects are always done in phases.

Speed bumps in execution

Last week, our son needed an ultrasound to help the doctor identify the source of pain in his abdomen. When he was being examined by the nurse, she discovered that his last meal was less than 8 hours ago (he was supposed to abstain from eating for at least 8 hours before the ultrasound). Without missing a beat, she said, "Well, now that you are here, let's do the best that we can."

No raving, no ranting, she did not give us a hard time. She calmly finished the ultrasound procedure and thanked us for coming by. She chose not to dwell on what should have been done (turns out the doctor forgot to give us the instructions to prepare for the ultrasound), she chose not to take out her frustrations on us (she had to put in some extra effort) and left us with a feeling that 'customers come first'. I am sure she made a mental note to fix the internal process to brief patients who come for an ultrasound.

How many businesses have trained their staff to retain customer loyalty while dealing with the realities of execution?

'Risk' vs. 'Issue'

A 'risk' is an event that has a probability of happening with positive or adverse consequences. Therefore, a risk description will read, "If this event happens, the consequences or impact will be ____; if the event happens, I will do ____; the probability of this happening is low/medium/low; and the steps we can take to prevent the risk from manifesting is ____."

An 'issue' is an event that has happened (100% certainty!) and it has to be addressed (or a decision to de-prioritize is needed). An issue statement will read, "This event has happened, the impact in lost revenue or increases cost is ____; ____ is accountable, ____ are going to do the work and ____ need to be consulted and informed; and the deadline for resolution is ____."

This clarity is required for executing strategy; in the absence of this clarity, resources are mis-applied in unproductive meetings and in the end the real 'risk' or 'issue' may not be identified and addressed.

#12: The Politics of Strategy Execution

'Politics' refers to situations where:

• There are multiple, conflicting needs;
  
• Decision making is slow and sub-optimal because essential information is unavailable or withheld;
• Support is provided or declined for reasons other than the merits of the case;
  
• Personal gain takes priority over the greater good;
• Interactions are dysfunctional and inter-personal communications frequently break down

We offer the root cause as immature processes operated by unskilled people.

To execute strategy relating to substantial issues (many, many people are impacted by the choices made), politics is inevitable (see definition of 'politics' above). Its not a perfect world, get used to it. Avoiding politics will result in the wrong people being in charge of finding solutions to substantial issues. Embracing politics as a way of life will increase the ranks of the 'wrong' people.

The only way out is to demonstrate leadership, be a role model and act with wisdom.

#11: Executing strategy in an imperfect world

When making a strategy and a plan to execute, the list of things to do may seem long and daunting. In addition, the lack of clarity of the inter-dependencies between tasks makes it harder to prioritize. Gaining clarity is not always cost effective or even possible.

As a first step, accept that it will take time to gain clarity on many of the tough issues that are barriers to executing strategy. Then, gain clarity on the ambiguity, i.e. list all the topics around which the organization is struggling to gain clarity.

Use your common sense and experience to select the first item to work on and get started. Everything is interconnected, so you will eventually cover all the interrelated parts. Its more important to gain consensus with your customers, stakeholders, partners and teammates about the sequence to follow, than to spend time discovering the 'right' sequence. Start small to control risk and improve using experience.

#10: How to execute on a 'cool idea'

Definition of a 'cool idea': It solves a real life problem, you are able to create a solution and customers agree to spend money and/or time to acquire the solution. You can execute on cool ideas by luck, or by doing the following:

• Understanding the customer's pain points at an experiential level
  
• Learning how a customer will use the product or service
• Possessing capabilities to produce the product or service
• Providing products or services better than your competition
• Sustaining value over time by adjusting to evolving customer needs
• Making money in the process or producing value that exceeds the cost incurred to produce it
  

If you cannot execute your strategy on a 'cool idea', its not really a 'cool idea' and without the above it is an exercise in futility.

#9: Using internal surveys to fine tune strategy execution

Its not a perfect world. Don't get carried away by the metrics you get, especially if the measurement methods are approximate or if you are measuring perceptions.

The conversation is more important than the survey results. If you can't or won't talk to people, the numbers don't matter anyway.

There is always more work to do than time or resources. Get the team aligned behind the priorities to reduce friction and increase positive momentum. Find out:

• If people are complaining about the de-prioritization of their pet project, or
• If people are complaining about not being included or heard, or
  
• If they are complaining about challenges in executing on priorities

Dealing with reality becomes easier after you identify it.

#8: Avoid neutrality: take a stand

Being neutral should not be confused with being objective or rational. Being or trying to be neutral is defensive behavior and is a sign of 'risk avoidance'. This behavior is sand in the gears that are working to execute strategy.

Take a stand. Look within to find the 'stand' you are comfortable with. Be true to yourself. Put yourself out there, take calculated risks. Acknowledge you are human and therefore come to terms with your own imperfections.

Mitigate the risk of being irrelevant or destructive through collaboration and appreciation of diversity.

Strategy is executed successfully when people are not afraid to take a stand and adjust their stand based on information that improves their clarity.

#7: Einstein and Strategy Execution

As the story goes, an interviewer asked Einstein, if you could ask God only one question, what would that be? Einstein responded, "I would ask him how the universe was created. To get to where we are today is just math." (As anyone who watches the History or Science Channel knows, physicists, among others, make it their mission and passion to find out how the universe was created).

Later in the interview, Einstein changed his mind and said, "I would ask why the universe was created. That will give me the reason for my existence."

In executing strategy, knowing 'why' and knowing 'how' are both critical. Try answering these two questions next time you have to execute strategy and are stuck on a seemingly insurmountable problem.