Have you ever found yourself managing week to week (or even day to day), running on the treadmill of business as usual to meet pressing deadlines and support your team, but with that sinking feeling that you should be stepping back to survey what lies…
What’s a mission? What’s a vision? And how do they differ? This a common source of confusion for people starting out in strategy and more broadly amongst members of organisations. I vividly recall a workshop we were facilitating with an executive team where we’d gone…
Organisations often talk about and focus on strategy. And rightly so: having organisational clarity on strategy improves organisational health and performance [link to the six questions]. Strategy essentially involves determining: These three elements correspond to Simon Sinek’s why – how – what model that he…
What do Alice in Wonderland and Roman philosophy have in common? They both share at least one important lesson on the importance of a clear vision for high performing teams and organisations. Vision statements are common, but they often exist in a going-through-the-motions, tick-the-box-of-a-strategic-planning-checklist kind…
Here’s what they get wrong: ❌ Taking months to finish the process❌ Distracting their already busy team with endless ‘planning days’❌ Drowning in analysis before even starting the plan❌ Spending a fortune on strategy consultants The truth: ✔️ You can create a solid strategic plan…
A plan is only as good as its outcomes. Here’s how to track progress and ensure your strategy is delivering results. It’s easy to feel good about a strategic plan when it’s fresh. But the real test is whether it delivers results. How do you…
Turkish Olympic shooter Yusuf Dekic reminds me of a common problem in management. So many of us overcomplicate things, because of sophistication bias… This is when we ignore simple solutions in search of something more complex, innovative or clever. As a result, we – wrongly…
Need a straightforward strategic plan for your team or organisation? All it takes is six simple questions… In @Patrick Lencioni’s book, The Advantage, he says that the best performing teams have extremely clear answers to six questions: We’ve developed a simple tool to capture and…
Here’s a quick way to test your organisation/team strategic plan quality. (it takes less than 20 minutes) We’ve developed a free 20 point strategic plan audit, which you can download here. The audit allows you to quickly assess the completeness, quality and implementation of your…
We’ve built a Strategic Planning Toolkit so any leader can create a plan for their team or organisation in a few weeks. A free sample is available to download now. Many managers want a plan. But they don’t know how to build one or where…
Update: Our Strategic Planning Toolkit has launched! Download a free preview here. Most leaders know they need a good strategic plan. But few know where to start. A Google search reveals lots of conflicting information on what a good strategic plan looks like. Most of…
The strongest organisations are those that are healthy, not just smart. Organisational health depends on four disciplines: developing a cohesive leadership team, creating strategic clarity, over-communicating that clarity throughout the organisation, and reinforcing strategy through systems and ways of working. Clarity doesn’t need to be complex and abstract, instead it can be achieved by answering six questions for any organisation: Why do we exist? How will we succeed? What do we do? Who does what? What’s most important, right now? How will we behave?
I have recently been reading about the history of outdoor clothing and gear company, Patagonia. There are a number of stories about Patagonia that perfectly illustrate the power of purpose in business. Examples include: Patagonia is an organisation that knows who they are and why…