Insight Into Execution

I read somewhere that strategy is a commodity whereas execution is an art. And I completely comply with the fact that today time has come for the organizations to focus less on intellectuality, analysis and strategy and more on implementing and making it work.

Execution is critical to success. Execution represents a disciplined process or a logical set of connected activities that enables an organization to take a strategy and make it work. Without a careful, planned approach to execution, strategic goals cannot be attained. Developing such a logical approach, however, represents a formidable challenge to management. Even with careful development of an execution plan at the business level, execution success is not guaranteed.

Although execution is critical to strategic success making strategy work presents a formidable challenge. A host of factors like organizational politics, bureaucracy, inertia and resistance to change get in the way of execution success.

Management literature has focused over the years primarily on parading new ideas on planning and strategy formulation in front of eager readers but it has sorely neglected execution.

Despite its importance, execution is often handled poorly by many organizations. There still are countless cases of good plans going awry because of substandard execution efforts. This raises some important questions.

If execution is central to success, why don't more organizations develop a disciplined approach to it? Why don't companies spend time developing and perfecting processes that help them achieve important strategic outcomes? Why can't more companies execute or implement strategies well and reap the benefits of those efforts? 

The simple answer, again, is that execution is extremely difficult. There are formidable roadblocks or hurdles that get in the way of the execution process and seriously injure the implementation of strategy. The road to successful execution is full of potholes that must be negotiated for execution success.

Some of the identified problems or hurdles affecting implementation are

1.      Managers are trained to plan and not to execute: One basic problem is that managers know more about strategy formulation than implementation. They are trained to plan, not to execute plans.

2.      Let the “Grunts” handle execution: Another problem is that some C-level and other top – level managers actually believe that strategy execution or implementation is “below them”, something best left to lower – level employees.

3.      Planning and execution are interdependent: Even though in reality there may be a separation of planning and execution tasks the two are highly interdependent. Planning affects execution. The execution of strategy in turn affects changes to strategy and planning over time. Successful strategic outcomes are best achieved when those responsible for execution are also part of the formulating process. The greater the interaction between the “doers” and “planners” the higher the probability of execution success.

4.      Execution takes longer than formulation: The execution of strategies usually takes longer than the formulation of strategy. Whereas planning may take weeks or months, the implementation of strategy is usually played over a much longer period of time. The longer time frame can make it harder for managers to focus on and control the execution process as many unforeseen things can materialize and challenge manager’s attention.

5.      Execution involves more people than strategy formulation: In addition to being played out over longer periods of time, strategy implementation always involves more people than formulation. This presents additional problems. Communication down the organization or across different functions becomes a challenge. Linking strategic objectives with the day-to-day objectives and concerns of personnel at different organizational levels and locations becomes a legitimate but challenging task. The larger the number of people involved, the greater the challenge of effective strategy execution. 

6.      Having guidelines for execution: Managers need a logical model to guide execution actions. Without guidelines execution becomes a hunky dory situation. Without guidance individuals do the things they think are important, often resulting in uncoordinated, divergent, even conflicting decisions and actions. Having a model or roadmap positively affects execution success.

7.      Managing change: Execution of strategy often involves change. Not handling change well will spell disaster for execution efforts. Managing change means much more than keeping people happy and reducing resistance to new ideas and methods.

8.      Coordination and information sharing: These are vital to effective execution. Knowing how to achieve coordination and information sharing in complex geographically dispersed organization is important to execution success. Yet managers are often motivated not to share the information or work with there colleagues to coordinate activities and achieve strategic and short-term goals. Why? The answer to this question is vital to the successful execution of strategy.