To put the matters in perspective, when a company is not doing well, the problems could be in any of the 2 areas or both of them
- People : If your people are not engaged and aligned to your company and its ways, it will be difficult to extract the value out of a given strategy because it is not getting implemented in the first place. For any strategy to work it is important that the implementers are engaged, adhering to the norms of the company, buy into the the goals and the strategy and are willing to be lead by the internal leaders. In this sense, as the book "Good to Great" says; "people are more important than the strategy"
- Strategy : The foundation of a good strategy is (a) directions, priorities and goals established based on a keen and proactive insights based on the environment (b) decisions regarding development and deploying of resources towards these goals based on evaluating all the options.
Implementation
is a ground that connects both and can be understood as "strategization
/ directing of people" or also as "peoplization of strategy". What
does a good implementation achieve? Basically, at an individual employee
level, the following should indicate that the strategy is implemented
well when the employee :
- "knows and owns" the vision, mission, goals and plans as if they are his own.
- knows how the company has organized its people and resources to make something happen. It is clear who is responsible for doing what, to implement which part of the strategy, in which region, account, location etc.
- is clear about what specific behavior is expected out of him and why.
- is confident of doing what needs to be done because he has done it before or because he has been trained well to do it.
- can rely on his boss, his colleagues to provide support towards the progress of the strategy - and not to act at cross-purposes.
- is motivated to put the strategy into practice.
- gets periodic feedback and help in course correction.
Other 6 points given below help to achieve this :
(1) COMMUNICATION : Management should be able to communicate
the strategy to external and internal audiences. The audiences cannot act
unless they understand and are motivated.
(2) LINKAGE : There should exist an appropriate PMS (Performance
Management System) that enables vertical and horizontal cascading from one
level to the other. Such a system should link the vision at the apex level to
the action of individuals in the organization.
- Framework : Balanced score card
- Framework : Cascaded Performance Management System
- Framework: Questions of strategy implementation
(3) CHANGE MANAGEMENT : The management should be aware the that
implementation of the strategy is about managing change : what not to
change and what to change. And it is also about exercising the leadership to
bring about the change by overcoming resistance and by motivation.
- Framework : 3 dimensions of strategic change : content (what) , process (how) and context (why and where).
(4) IMPLICIT ASSUMPTIONS : There are certain kinds of (mostly
implicit) organizational assumptions that every management makes while
running the company. It is important to know which assumptions fit the
execution of what type of strategy.
(5) EMBODIMENT : Translation of the strategy on paper to
its implementation on the ground is a tedious process. A strategy gets truly
implemented when it gets embedded into 6 Ss : the structure, staff,
skills, systems, shared values and style fits the strategy.
(6) ORGANIZATION : Certain kinds of strategies are favored
/ hampered by certain organizational structures. It is important to have
the right structures for the chosen strategy.
- Framework : Interaction between strategy and structure
- Framework : simple, functional and multi-division structures
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