My family have enjoyed making music for a few generations: My dad (Bobby Norris) sang under the Capitol Records label in the 1950s, I’ve been playing and writing music a little most of my life (not professionally, though I’ve written and produced an EP on Itunes), my middle son is a jazz pianist, two other sons are vocalists, and my youngest (daughter) is a clarinet player.
All of us (like many of you) can instantly determine if a person is singing sharp or flat. Though many would say that this person is “tone deaf,” the real culprit is execution. More and more studies are saying that tested “tone deaf” people really have good tone recognition. The problem is their muscle control to reproduce it. An APA article states, ” The pattern of results across experiments demonstrates multiple possible causes of poor singing, and attributes most of the problem to poor motor control and timbral-translation errors, rather than a purely perceptual deficit…”
This sounds a lot like strategy. Failure of strategic plans usually are not the result of the plan, but the execution. If you are considering executing a strategic plan, here are some tips:
- Put the Right People on the Bus: Jim Collins (Good to Great) professes “You can’t start off by asking which direction you’re headed in … First you figure out if you’ve got all the right people on the bus, then you figure out where to drive.” This is really essential. Small and large companies have “culture” problems. In other words, companies have people within them that do not want to change what the company is doing, and how it is doing it. Those people are the biggest threat to the strategy implementation before it gets off the ground. You must really take a look at your team and make the hard decisions.
- Develope an operating plan: Develop a plan that is consistent with both long-term and short-term goals. In other words, you should look at your vision, your 20 year horizon and work backwards using milestones to gauge your progress.
- Cascade your operating plan: Make sure you design your plan to be implemented on different levels: organizational, department, region, division, unit, and employee levels.
- Communicate your plan to all levels: This is self explanatory.
- Assign the right people to the right roles: Don’t force someone to perform in an area that they are not gifted in.
- Measure your results: As many have said, if you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it.
- Evaluate and adjust: Your tactics and operational plan should always be flexible and adjustable.
This list is not meant to be complete, but a sketch of stages that you should consider before you implement ( or maybe even design) your strategic plan. Upfront planning may save your plan if done prudently, and keep your company humming a tune of prosperity.