YOU MIGHT BE SURPRISED TO KNOW THAT MANY BUSINESSES DON’T HAVE A STRATEGIC PLAN.
Those that do often fail to communicate them well enough to ensure adoption. Or, they develop strategies that are unfortunately average – or PAR – in quality, lacking the substance and commitment to drive measurable progress. Throughout more than 20 years working in strategy, I often see three things that keep strategic plans from being effective and remaining PAR – Platitudes, no Accountability, and no Research. Let’s dive into these common mistakes and how to avoid them.
PLATITUDES – A TYPICAL MISTAKE MANY BUSINESSES MAKE IS CREATING GOALS THAT AREN’T UNIQUE TO THEIR ORGANIZATIONS, SPECIFIC OPERATIONS, OR STAKEHOLDERS, SO THEY OFTEN COME OFF AS PLATITUDES.
For example, a business might establish a goal to “provide excellent customer service” – something just about every business wants to achieve. These platitudes don’t connect with employees or other stakeholders to drive strategic change. Another way platitudes hurt is that they don’t link to issues of real importance to the business. They sound good, but goals need to have a direct link to real issues affecting the business or areas of strength to further build upon.
To avoid platitudes, start your goal-setting process with a robust situation analysis. Once you have a complete and accurate description of your business today, then we can begin comparing that to how you want to describe your business in the future. Those future statements are prioritized and become goals. For example, if employee engagement and morale is low today, then a future goal would be to describe your employees as ‘enthusiastic champions of the company’s products and services with a sense of ownership in the firm’s success.’ As a goal, it is a sufficiently broad to both describe an accomplishment of the mission and be broken down further to actionable areas for change.
NO ACCOUNTABILITY – TRUTH BE TOLD, OFTEN THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN SUCCESS AND FAILURE IS SIMPLY THE SHEER WILL TO EXECUTE.
People aren’t prepared for the commitment it takes to truly drive change. In our recent work with a client, we got down to the essential step of assigning tasks. This is when the conversation took a wrong turn. The team was excited to create lofty goal statements, but when it came to actually carrying out the essential tasks to achieve their goals, they lost steam. They tried to restate the goal to lower expectations or assign tasks to others to reduce their workload. The reality is that without strong accountability and ownership, strategic plans don’t matter. An organization’s culture must be ready to own the change they want to achieve. And, that takes hard work.
When I think about this, it reminds me of a quote by Rev. Jesse Jackson, Sr., who said, “Both tears and sweat are salty, but they render a different result. Tears will get you sympathy; sweat will get you change.” Making change takes accountability and hard work.
NO RESEARCH – FINALLY, MANY STRATEGIC PLANS ARE BUILT ON GUT FEEL AND LACK THE NECESSARY RESEARCH TO FULLY UNDERSTAND THE CHALLENGES THE ORGANIZATIONS FACE AND THE TRUE STRENGTHS THEY HAVE TO BUILD UPON.
One of the first questions I ask when working with clients is if they have a customer survey (or another way to get direct feedback), and I’m always surprised when they don’t. This is one way – and usually an easy one – to ensure that actual data is built into strategic decision making. Investing time to understand industry trends, benchmark competition, gain employee and customer feedback, conduct internal data analysis, and more are all critical steps to understand an organization’s current situation. Organizations must be so focused on learning that research and analysis are the default mode governing everything they do.
Strategic plans are essential to the future success of any business, so don’t just make them a task to check off. Invest the time to ensure they are developed with the necessary components and care to exceed PAR and become exceptional. Understand that patience and hard work are required for true transformation.
