PowerPoint lures many a finely-honed strategy into its lair, where it then suffocates all life from it. And the ugliest of those deaths even have spreadsheets copied into the slide decks. PowerPoints give us a feeling of having structured something. Given it shape. Made a declaration. Add a spreadsheet, and now we have data! With […]
Execution
Where Your Strategy Goes to Die #3 – Playing the field
You’ve put the ring on your strategy’s finger as a leadership team. But no sooner you’ve walked out the room than a member of the leadership team presses you with an attractive-looking opportunity that brings in a number. But it doesn’t align. “Yes, I know we said we’d focus on building our brand on ethical […]
Where your strategy goes to die #2: 30% of 10 ≠ 100% of 3
I remember sitting in a leadership team strategy awayday some years back where the team agreed on its 14 priorities. … 14. Fourteen. … More than double the number of company priorities than the number of members of the leadership team. You’re on a hiding to nothing if your strategy consists of a large (e.g. […]
Where Your Strategy Goes to Die #1 – A wish-list of serious sounding business words
Here are 3 strategic objectives I’ve seen more than once: Employee engagement Marketing Customer retention Trouble is they’re not strategic objectives. They’re topics. Functions. At best a wish-list of stuff we want to look at, get better at, or start doing. But not strategic objectives. For your strategy is to stand a hope of happening, […]
Are you a mini-Boris? Am I? Are we all?
On climate, on social issues, on using business for good – are we all mini-Borises? Boris’s climate policies and plans (inasmuch as they exist) fall a long way short of Boris’s climate promises. If you’re generous, you may flatter him with a “road to hell paved with good intentions”. If you’re a cynic, you’ll see […]