Most frequently requested interventions
Improve, renew, and innovate faster? These are the most frequently requested interventions from Strategy = Execution.
Organizations that excel in strategy execution enjoy a three-month advantage in lead-time-to-execution and save 50% in total execution and innovation process time. They achieve 15 to 25% more of their goals. And these organizations increase their strategy execution capacity year after year, because they use a single language and method for the essentials of modern strategy execution.
By selectively picking the right critical change initiatives in your portfolio and working with agile and powerful execution coalitions, you can achieve a real breakthrough in execution.”
– Cees de Wijs, CEO Division Infrastructure VolkerWessels – Cees de Wijs, CEO, Dynniq
The eight most requested interventions
The most frequently requested interventions based on Strategy = Execution:
1
Strategy Acceleration Sessions
Goal: to concretize strategy, answer outstanding questions and test assumptions; to get from an abstract strategy to an executable one.
There’s almost always a strategy of sorts, but seldom an effective strategy that forms a solid foundation for execution. Experience has shown that strategies frequently leave too much room for interpretation and set vague goals for distant time horizons. As a rule of thumb, “10 centimeters of vagueness at the top equals 10 meters of vagueness lower down in the organization.”
A good strategy answers the following questions in clear, qualitative and quantitative terms: Which markets and customers do we want to serve? Why would we be likely to succeed there? By offering which products, services and value? Using which revenue model? What is our UVP? What demands does this put on our business model, and hence, on our processes, structure and governance, competencies and culture, technology and data management, and knowledge? Which portfolio of change initiatives do we need to execute this strategy?
A good strategy answers the following questions in clear, qualitative and quantitative terms: Which markets and customers do we want to serve? Why would we be likely to succeed there? By offering which products, services and value? Using which revenue model? What is our UVP? What demands does this put on our business model, and hence, on our processes, structure and governance, competencies and culture, technology and data management, and knowledge? Which portfolio of change initiatives do we need to execute this strategy?
Goal: to make smart choices in an ambitious yet feasible change portfolio.
This proven approach helps you translate your strategy into a portfolio of change initiatives in just 3 to 6 weeks. You learn to put the knife into the usual proliferation of outsize, unruly change initiatives without a clear scope.
Experience has shown that 33% of most change portfolios are in fact day-to-day tasks on the Running the Business side of strategy execution. Another 33% have an incorrect and/or overlapping mandate and/or scope, while 10% are zombie projects—in other words, projects that have become more or less permanent, and were started so long ago that no one remembers why. Did you know that 80% of organizations have bulging change portfolios, containing as much as 60 to 150 projects? Talk about setting yourself up for disappointment…
In a carefully considered selection process, you define a widely-supported change portfolio of initiatives and select your 9 most critical projects. You describe each of these in detail on a single page and on the second page, you specify the execution coalition needed to execute this initiative. This is the group of people who are going to assume ownership for the execution of the initiative and for the realization of its benefits. This frees up resources and gets all key actors to focus on the project and believe in its doability. The intervention includes a ‘to don’t’ list.
Experience has shown that 33% of most change portfolios are in fact day-to-day tasks on the Running the Business side of strategy execution. Another 33% have an incorrect and/or overlapping mandate and/or scope, while 10% are zombie projects—in other words, projects that have become more or less permanent, and were started so long ago that no one remembers why. Did you know that 80% of organizations have bulging change portfolios, containing as much as 60 to 150 projects? Talk about setting yourself up for disappointment…
In a carefully considered selection process, you define a widely-supported change portfolio of initiatives and select your 9 most critical projects. You describe each of these in detail on a single page and on the second page, you specify the execution coalition needed to execute this initiative. This is the group of people who are going to assume ownership for the execution of the initiative and for the realization of its benefits. This frees up resources and gets all key actors to focus on the project and believe in its doability. The intervention includes a ‘to don’t’ list.
2
Change Portfolio Management: purge, select and balance your change portfolio
3
Breakthrough: facilitate your 3 most critical initiatives (‘change begets change’)
Goal: to achieve tangible results in your top 3 critical initiatives.
Providing these initiatives with customized support increases their chances of success, which in turn will inspire the execution coalitions working on other initiatives. With a set of specific actions and proven, practical methods, we help you to carry out the actual execution for each critical change initiative. We work with your people to ensure that:
1. it’s perfectly clear why the issue is so important
2. a breakthrough is achieved—typically by implementing three solutions fully instead of five halfheartedly
3. the first shot lands on target—because you often get only one shot
4. every key player personally checks in at a psychological level—people’s hearts need to be in it
5. the change is secured
6. the benefits are measured and the necessary adjustments made
7. lessons are learned.
1. it’s perfectly clear why the issue is so important
2. a breakthrough is achieved—typically by implementing three solutions fully instead of five halfheartedly
3. the first shot lands on target—because you often get only one shot
4. every key player personally checks in at a psychological level—people’s hearts need to be in it
5. the change is secured
6. the benefits are measured and the necessary adjustments made
7. lessons are learned.
Goal: to become a more flexible, efficient and effective organization by using just one language and method.
Action- Based Learning in the Strategy = Execution Masterclass
Organizations that excel at strategy execution have chosen a single language and method for the essentials of strategy execution appropriate to their line of business and organization. Not only does this increase their effectiveness in executing change initiatives, it also boosts their strategy execution capacity year after year.
Click here for more information on the masterclass.
4
Masterclass: a single language & method
5
Benefits realization management & monitoring
Goal: measuring whether you are achieving what you set out to achieve.
Effective monitoring of your benefits. You set up measuring and benefit tracking systems right from the start of your first execution wave. You measure progress based on facts. Professionals need room to manage their responsibilities. Self-monitoring is more effective than supervision. The way you monitor matters. Let’s keep it simple and use modern visual management technology (dashboards with progress information).
Appeal: Communicate, Test and Enrich Your Strategy
You first want to test your strategy and enrich it with new ideas to create a living strategy. That requires much more than just one-way communication: the ‘why’ has to be crystal clear. Telling an attractive story is a must. Strategy-setting is not a solo effort—a select few people are involved—but not every key actor. Getting them involved is important to garner broad support, but also to obtain information that will help you choose the right execution strategy.
6
Appeal: communicate, test and enrich your Strategy
7
Activate: foster true ownership through execution coalitions and psychological check-ins
Goal: to inspire key actors to willingly take responsibility for an intiative, to ‘want to’ rather than ‘have to’.
In other words, treat them like entrepreneurs instead of employees. It’s time to acknowledge the importance of the soft side of change. In this intervention, we work with your leaders to ensure that the key actors who lead and execute your critical change initiatives (the ‘execution coalitions’) get a chance to take true ownership, right from the analysis stage through the entire intervention.
Goal: to organize strategy execution as a continuous process, structure, form of governance, set of resources, conduct and knowledge.
Aim for a decentralized structure where possible (agile teams), and centralized where necessary (transformation or program management office). Once organizations have increased their execution capacity, they try to secure and institutionalize this capacity. What often happens in practice, however, is fragmentation, leading to people reinventing the wheel. IT often manages a pool of project leaders, there is a central program management office (PMO) for big transformations, HR has its own pool for organizational development (MD & OD) and some organizations have introduced a new way of working in agile teams (e.g. ING bank, with its tribes, squads, chapters and guilds).
Who can keep track of it all? That is not to say that any one of these structures is the one and only, but clearly there is a need for rationalization and coherence. You have to consider all these structures and decide which need to be centralized and which decentralized—in the heart of the various divisions and business units.
Who can keep track of it all? That is not to say that any one of these structures is the one and only, but clearly there is a need for rationalization and coherence. You have to consider all these structures and decide which need to be centralized and which decentralized—in the heart of the various divisions and business units.
8
Treat Strategy execution as a discipline
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