Are you working in an organization which values execution by leaders at all levels? Are the leaders in your organization relentlessly focused on achieving results?
One of the most powerful questions one can ask oneself in the present moment is “Which people will do the job– and how will they be judged and held accountable?” You need to deliver on your promises and hold people accountable to successfully achieve remarkable results.
Are you focused on reality and getting things through people? How effective are you at meshing strategy with reality, aligning people with goals, and achieving the results promised? Are you energized by achieving goals at work that emotionally fire up your people with meaning and purpose?
“Execution is the great unaddressed issue in the business world today. Its absence is the single biggest obstacle to success and the cause of most of the disappointments that are mistakenly attributed to other causes.” ― Ram Charan, author of What the CEO Wants You to Know and Boards that Work.
Leaders make big promises… and then there are big gaps in what their organizations actually deliver. They have problems with accountability– people aren’t doing what they’re supposed to do.
Execution is not just something that does or doesn’t get done. Execution is a culture with specific set of behaviors and techniques that companies need to master in order to have competitive advantage.
Execution is not only the biggest issue facing business today, it is something nobody has explained satisfactorily. Execution is not just tactic – it is a discipline and a system. It has to be built into a company’s strategy, its goals, and its culture. And the leader of the organization must be deeply engaged in it.
“Many people regard execution as detail work that’s beneath the dignity of a business leader. That’s wrong … it’s a leader’s most important job.” ― Larry Bossidy, former chairman and CEO, Honeywell International
According to Ram Charan and Larry Bossidy in their book Execution (2002), a lack of focus on the discipline of execution is the main reason companies fall short on their promises. It explains the gap between what leaders want and what they deliver.
It is a system of getting things done through questioning, analysis and follow-through. It is a discipline for meshing strategy with reality, aligning people with goals, and achieving the results promised.
It should be a central part of a company’s strategy and goals and the most important job of any leader. It requires a comprehensive understanding of the business, its people, and its environment. An execution culture links the three core processes of any business – the people process, the strategy, and the operating plan – together to get things done on time.
The execution phase forces the leaders to translate the broad-brush conceptual understanding of the company’s strategy into an action plan for how it will all happen: who will do what in which sequence, how long those tasks will take, how much will they cost, and how they will affect subsequent activities.
Execution is a systematic process of rigorously discussing “what, how, and why”, of questioning, tenaciously following through, and of ensuring accountability. In its most fundamental sense, execution is a systematic way of exposing reality and acting on it. Most companies do not face reality very well. That is the basic reason they can’t execute.
Execution Questions
- Which people will do the job– and how will they be judged and held accountable?
- What human, technical, production and financial resources are needed to execute the strategy?
- Will the organization have the resources it needs two years out, when the strategy goes to the next level?
- Does the strategy deliver the earnings required for success?
- Can it be broken down into doable initiatives?
People engaged in the processes argue these questions, search out reality and reach specific and practical conclusions. Everybody agrees about their responsibilities for getting things done, and everybody commits to those responsibilities.
Working with a seasoned executive coach trained in emotional intelligence and incorporating leadership assessments such as the Bar-On EQ-i and CPI 260 can help you become a more execution focused leader. You can become a leader who models emotional intelligence, and who inspires people to become happily engaged with the strategy and vision of the company.
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