strategic planning: innovation: management:success

SOME DO’S AND DONT’S OF THE PROCESS

You’re finally going to do it. You are a born again believer in the benefits of business and strategic planning. To prepare you for the plunge here’s some rules of the road to guide you through the process.

The planning process can be exhilarating, frustrating, enlightening, demanding and a host of other descriptive adjectives. Hopefully you’ll find a nugget or two in these do’s and don’ts that will keep the emphasis on the positives of your unique organizational growth experience. Carpe Diem!

“Plans are nothing; planning is everything.“-Dwight D. Eisenhower

SOME PLANNING DO’S:

• It’s the process that counts! Think verb rather than noun. Bringing your team together, fostering interaction, and forming a climate of mutual interdependence and commitment is the real achievement. The final document is not as important as the process that gets you there.
• Do trust your instincts. You have lived and breathed what your company is all about. Your plan has to feel right in your gut. Contemplative logic and passionate emotion are good tools. Use them both.
• Keep the emphasis on communication. Your planning is the linkage between your future, the team that will take you there and the other stakeholders in your enterprise. It’s the glue that binds it all together and drives performance. Communication is the oxygen for your organization’s future.
• Focus on EXECUTION. Remember, results are what count. The best plan in the world is worthless if it can’t be executed. Unfortunately, they don’t give Pulitzer Prizes for business plans. An executable plan on a napkin is a preferable alternative to an elaborate document that gathers dust.
• Keep it flexible, adaptive and evolving. As Yogi Berra said, “the future ain’t what it used to be”. Your planning should be an ongoing living process that can adapt and change as competitive, technological and social conditions evolve. Keep it dynamic not static.
• Stretch. Challenge your organization to extraordinary achievement. Your plan should inspire, motivate and paint a compelling vision for performance. It should keep everyone’s juices flowing.
• Expect unintended consequences. There’s an old English Proverb that states “every path has its puddle”. Regardless of your collective wisdom, there will be unforeseen ramifications, pro and con. Acknowledge this as part of the planning process.
• Enjoy the process. What a wonderful opportunity to bring together the people you admire to form a compelling future together. Getting a lot done and having a lot of fun. Go for it.

SOME PLANNING DONT’S:

• Don’t delegate responsibility (embrace it). This is one management project you can’t delegate away. As CEO, you have to embrace and champion the process. Leadership goes with the position. Rise to the occasion.
• Don’t get caught in the terminology trap. Planning terminology (vision, mission, strategy, tactics, performance metrics, etc.) can murk things up. It should help your team communicate not hinder them. The challenge is to keep the process understandable to all. It’s not important what you call it as long as it drives team performance.
• Don’t get overwhelmed. Keep it simple. If it seems to complex, then back off. Try to rephrase and simplify the process. A plan doesn’t have to read like “War and Peace” to be effective.
• Don’t look for the perfect plan. Perfection is for the next life. As Patton’s’ law expresses it, “a good plan today is better than a perfect plan tomorrow”.
• Don’t deny the facts. Reality can be harsh, but the sooner you accept it, the sooner it can be addressed. There is a fine line between rationalizing failure and denial of reality. The challenge is to know the difference.
• Don’t get trapped by your plan. The purpose of the plan is guide and drive performance. If it becomes unrealistic don’t continue to follow a bad road map. Change it.
• Don’t do it if you’re not going to use it. Be committed to the process. Your passion must be overwhelming if it’s to be effective. You have the opportunity to develop a culture of performance. Don’t go through the motions if it won’t make a difference.

“It wasn’t raining when Noah built the ark.”  Howard Ruff

Greg Pashke , CMC is  President of Pashke Consulting and provides business mentoring, strategic and tactical planning, and financial modeling services. Greg is a big proponent of The One Page Plan approach to managing the day to day performance of an organization. It’s simplicity in action. He is committed to continuous learning and skill development. Greg’s mantra is “to get a lot done & have a lot of fun”.
Website: http://www.pashkeconsulting.com/

strategic planning: innovation: management:success

COMMUNICATING YOUR VISION: TIMING IS IMPORTANT

When sharing your vision both the content and timing are vital to successful communication. I’d like to share an old story from a different era about one man’s failure to inspire his spouse to a higher level of performance.

MEN AT PLAY ARE NOT ALWAYS INSIGHTFUL

It sure seemed like a good idea. Let’s reward the guys with a home cooked meal. After a full shift (8+ hours) of drinking and carousing, some nourishment was in order. It’s not easy to imbibe for this duration and so the chosen few should be recognized for their feat. So, Joe invited the gang to his house for an early morning treat.
They entered the house with all the decorum of a gaggle of geese in heat. When you’re inebriated, you never sound loud to yourself or your fellow companions. It’s the sober souls that have the overly sensitive ears. Joe and his compadres gathered near the foot of the stairs and Joe called out to his lovely bride upstairs. As she appeared, Joe shared his plan for her to prepare a gourmet feast of bacon, eggs, home fries, toast and coffee for him and his posse of revelers. To Joe’s surprise and astonishment, his bride was not an enthusiastic participant in his vision. In fact, she told him what he could do with his suggestion in very graphic terms.

Joe, leaning on the post for moral support, stood tall in front of his buddies and indignantly responded, What, no Brefass? It’s another little known fact that drinking brings with it a shortened vocabulary. Isn’t brefass more succinct and colorful than breakfast? Doesn’t it convey a certain visual image?

The harsh reality was this “band of brothers” were on their own. No food in this Inn.

Moral: Not Everyone Shares Your Vision! (Know the right time to reveal it.)

Greg Pashke , CMC is  President of Pashke Consulting and provides business mentoring, strategic and tactical planning, and financial modeling services. Greg is a big proponent of The One Page Plan approach to managing the day to day performance of an organization. He is committed to continuous learning and skill development. Greg’s mantra is “to get a lot done & have a lot of fun”.
Website: http://www.pashkeconsulting.com/

It’s my pleasure to introduce a man of the highest ethics who has proven himself an outstanding accountant, strategist, futurist and business consultant for corporate clients large and small. I am honored Greg has agreed to share his insights and humor for Thinking Big Works readers. Enjoy. – David VanAmburg

USE A STORY TO PUMP UP YOUR POINT

I’m a big believer in the power of stories to convey a message and to elevate communication. A story is a wonderful way of expressing an idea, fact or point of view. In the hands of a skillful master, a well-crafted story can both simplify and communicate complex concepts. One of my favorite gifted story-tellers was the late Carl Sagan who could convey difficult scientific theories in terms that were fascinating, memorable and yet understandable by the average Greg. And trust me. That is no small accomplishment.

TWO WAYS OF CONVEYING A CONCEPT

For example, rather than a boring recital of the scientific explanation of “artificial selection” which Wikipedia defines as “the process of intentional or unintentional modification of a species through human actions which encourages the breeding of certain traits over others”, Carl Sagan had another approach in his landmark PBS series, Cosmos.

Imagine we have a magic window in which we can peer into the past. The year is 1185 and you are watching a great naval battle in an inland-sea in Japan. There are two warring factions of samurai warriors. The smaller fleet is defending the right of the seven-year old Emperor to rule Japan. The larger fleet consists of warriors who feel they have the right and obligation to rule the land. As the battle ensues, it becomes clear that the smaller fleet of the emperor is losing badly. We watch in astonishment as rather than surrender, the remaining samurai warriors of the emperor and the emperor himself cast themselves into the sea where they all drown. An honorable death is cherished more than potential survival through the humility of surrender.

Our story does not end here however. We continue to observe what happens in this inland sea over the next 800 years. We observe the fisherman who catch crabs from its waters. They look at the back of each crab that they trap. If the shell back bears any resemblance to the face of a samurai warrior, they put it back, out of respect for the fallen warriors. In the early years after the battle, the returned crabs have a vague resemblance to the face of a samurai warrior, but as time passes we see that more and more of the crabs begin to bear an uncanny resemblance to the honored samurai. The scientific explanation for this remarkable process is called artificial selection. Those respectful fisherman, over the course of eight centuries intervened in the natural selection process.They determined which biological characteristics were most desirable. They literally changed the course of nature and the evolution pattern of the crabs. From our view into the past we see that human intervention can have profound implications for other species.

Isn’t Carl’s approach more robust, illustrative and memorable? Think of the impact this story has to convey the relationship between man and our environment and the fiduciary responsibility that accompanies it.

“First figure out WHY you want the students to learn the subject and WHAT you want them to know, and the method will result more or less by common sense.” – Richard Feynman

Carl’s style emulates the “Philosophy of Teaching” of another hero of mine Richard Feynman: “First figure out WHY you want the students to learn the subject and WHAT you want them to know, and the method will result more or less by common sense.“ Carl had a masterful way to harness the power of stories to embody this approach.

Together, our challenge is to use the innate power of story-telling to better convey ideas, improve understanding, and to enhance the effectiveness of our communications. Whatever your profession or field of endeavor, I urge you to give stories a try. There is a latent storyteller (and maybe a little ham) in all of us that needs to be free.

So please accept the challenge:

Once upon a time there …….

THANKS DAVID

Thank you for the honor of being a contributor to Thinking Big Works. I’ve always been impressed by the breadth and depth of your business and organizational endeavors. Your commitment to life-long learning, your passion for excellence and your ability to comprehend and communicate knowledge and significant trends has been an inspiration for me.The fact that we met so early in our childhood has simply given me additional time to learn and grow from our relationship.

Greg Pashke , CMC is  President of Pashke Consulting and provides business mentoring, strategic and tactical planning, and financial modeling services. Greg is a devout generalist who believes that it’s essential to have an “overall” perspective for the diverse functional aspects of an organization to work in harmony towards overall objectives. He is committed to continuous learning and skill development. Greg’s mantra is “to get a lot done & have a lot of fun”.
Website: http://www.pashkeconsulting.com