The ability to execute fast is one problem most organizations are grappling with. Those organizations that have not only demystified their execution challenges but also understand the power that customers or consumers have in this fast-changing world are the ones that will win.
With the democratization of data across the globe, there is now a high level of exposure for buyers and users to products availability and transparency. As it is now, a consumer can simply make buying decisions via their smartphones – as they can access product features and prices on the go, so this has put tremendous power in the hands of the consumers. Let’s take for an example, if one needs to buy a television, all he or she needs to do is to call up Google or the likes and search for television prices in any location and at the end will have plethora of options. What does this mean to businesses in general? It means organizations must understand the power of execution especially of what they have to do in order to remain relevant now that organizations are finding it hard to maintain a long-term competitive advantage.
With the strong emergence of technology and disruptions in almost every sector, it is gradually becoming difficult for organizations to keep competitive advantages over a long time. Organizations need to be aware that competition won’t come from their industries alone, for example, pay-tv won’t compete anymore with other players in the same industry. Rather they will compete with the likes of YouTube etc. Now, anyone that wants to take the currency out of the customers’ pocket, will have to understand that the dynamics have changed and it is no more business as usual.
Organizations need to understand that in staying ahead of the game, they have to execute faster, and at an averagely lower cost than its competitors. And truth be told execution has been a major challenge in almost every industry. Interestingly it won’t get any easier and the reason is simple. Organizations want to scale, and scaling is a good thing; the more you scale, the more complex things become. Scaling might mean more products offerings, or more locations etc. Scaling comes with its own complexities, and more often than not, execution also becomes a huge challenge, as most managers are not armed with a framework or a structure for execution. What they are armed with is a series of isolated actions that have worked based on knowledge and experience.
A major setback when organizations scale is the notion that execution isn’t as useful as design. The mindset is to simply put out a better strategy out there that they think or assume is better than the competitions intent, and then they hope that the lower cadre employees will get the job done. CEOs and managers need to understand that execution is for everyone in the organization to partake. CEOs and Managers need to understand that strategic plans won’t just execute itself. Equal time, resources and personnel should be allocated to the execution of their strategic intents for their plans to be successful. Fortune observed that investors aren’t too perturbed about intent, they are looking for CEO’s who can execute.
Most leaders and managers have failed to understand that their organizations are one big system, and decisions should be taken based on how each part of the system interact with each other. What this means is that there is a lot of interdependencies that need to occur when things are set in motion. In most cases, the bigger the organization the bigger the interdependency. A holistic approach has to be taken to execution, managers should understand that the law of cause and effect is always at play within the organization. The law of cause and effect means that for point B to be a reality, I must successfully execute point A. To better understand cause and effect, I have always recommended the causal chain tool. A causal chain helps organizations not just to fish out pain-points but it also helps to lay out a path for achieving the company’s overall objective. It can link ideas with specific actions to be carried out, which ends up aiding the execution process. To be fair, this is not a walk in the park as organizations tend to make leaps of logic when using this tool. Someone might say: If I go on social media, I will increase my profits. This sounds pretty straight forward right? But if we peel the layers, we would see that this is a wish, and not direct steps of actions to be taken to get to the company’s overall objective which is to increase profits. Organizations have to put on their thinking caps and ensure that leaps of logics are avoided as much as possible.
The beauty of tools like the one we have discussed here is the ability to help organizations align resources and strategic objective. This is critical in strategy execution. Research has shown that most organizations tend to just throw projects into the fray in the bid of not “putting all their eggs in one basket”. What this means is that resources become scarce, employees become dis-illusioned as they do not know which objective is priority. Managers should make it a point of duty to always put on the handbrakes before committing to new initiatives. I am aware that the environment is changing and as such, competitive advantage is been eroded, but you need to understand if your organization has the capacity to pull off the proposed initiatives.
In conclusion, executives and managers must understand that regardless of how compelling their intentions, plans and strategies are towards growing their organizations, if they don’t make execution an accepted culture, they may end up underperforming.
Ifeoluwa Taiwo
Taiwo is an experienced Business Development and Strategy professional with industry experience spanning years in Educational Management, Financial Services and Media, Human Resources and Management Consulting. ifeoluwapotaiwo@gmail.com
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