September is International Strategic Thinking Month. Are you helping or hindering strategic thinking in your company?
Newswise — As they face a challenging economic climate, scores of businesses are experiencing a downturn in profits and a reduction in productivity. Struggling to overcome this situation, many companies are seeking a strategy that will help them to survive and even thrive in the months and years ahead.
Since September is officially International Strategic Thinking Month, what better time to step back and consider how cultivating strategic thinking within your corporate culture can improve overall business performance?
“It’s very easy for people to become paralyzed by fear and uncertainty these days,” say Josh Leibner and Gershon Mader, co-founders of Quantum Performance, Inc., and co-authors of the new book The Power of Strategic Commitment: Achieving Extraordinary Results Through TOTAL Alignment and Engagement (AMACOM, 2009).
“This places a greater demand on leaders to keep staff focused on the prospect of a brighter, yet plausible future. Managers can do this by helping their staff learn to think strategically about the company and their own careers,” they say.
Working with Fortune 1000 companies around the globe, Mader and Leibner have found that encouraging strategic thinking from the top of the organization to the shop floor is largely a matter of executive action and intention. Here’s their take on how executives and mangers hinder or help strategic thinking:
“When executives make strategy development an activity exclusive to the top members of the organization, they discourage strategic thinking,” says Mader.
Leibner agrees and adds that executives and managers stifle strategic thinking by not actively being open to others’ feedback, pushback and ideas. “When people feel that their suggestions are not being met with receptiveness, they will not participate in a strategic discussion, even when given the chance,” he says.
To overcome this dynamic, they advise getting everyone in the company involved in strategic conversations. “If you demonstrate that you are committed to other people’s ideas by incorporating and promoting them, you will encourage people to think strategically,” says Mader.
One easy process the authors recommend is to pick several areas where you want to create a breakthrough in performance and form teams. Gather people from varying levels and departments, creating a blue team and red team for each desired area of breakthrough. Then have a friendly competition for ideas on how to achieve the desired leap forward.
“To encourage maximum strategic thinking, tell the groups that you are looking for ‘out-of-the-box, yet plausible’ ways to take the organization to the next level,” say Mader and Leibner.
According to Leibner and Mader, another common contributor to hindered strategic thinking is when staff are always asked to put forth their tactical ideas, but never their strategic ones.
“Executives can encourage strategic thinking by making sure meetings are balanced out between time dedicated to discussing long-term, strategic issues and short-term, tactical ones,” advise Leibner and Mader. “One of the biggest complaints we hear in companies is that all the meetings are about tactical items. Employees complain that time is never spent having conversations about the bigger picture and longer-term issues.”
Finally, Mader and Leibner warn that leaders who micromanage create an environment of compliance where people won’t think strategically and don’t act as partners.
“Micromanaging suffocates strategic thinking because it forces people to interact at a tactical level only,” says Leibner. “It requires people to protect their world, and a huge amount of their energy just goes into how to survive and keep their boss off their back,” adds Mader.
To counteract this, Leibner and Mader suggest that executives and managers ask their staff to think about what they would do if they were put in charge of a particular situation, department or organization. “Ask your staff what they would start, stop or continue,” says Leibner. “Then discuss the responses as a group so people can learn to think strategically at a level or two above their current job.”
Just remember, warn Leibner and Mader, that you will never get any company strategy perfect, rational or right enough to work without having engagement and commitment at all levels. Encouraging your staff to participate in strategic planning and practice strategic thinking is key to creating a strategy that does not just get talked, but walked.
Cheat Sheet of Strategic Thinking Dos and Don’ts
Do:
Actively ask for input from all departments and levels Promote and incorporate others’ ideas Ask your staff what they would start, stop or continue in your positionRoutinely balance out your meetings by discussing both strategic and tactical issues
Don’t:
Make strategic development an exclusive club limited to the higher-upsStifle strategic thinking by not being open to and acting on others’ feedbackTry and maintain control by micromanaging Solely focus on and encourage tactical thinking in meetings
About Josh Leibner and Gershon Mader
Josh Leibner and Gershon Mader are founding partners of Quantum Performance, Inc. Over the past 20 years, they have worked with Fortune 500 companies around the world including: Capital One, Cisco, The United Way, AT&T, Prudential, Cushman & Wakefield and others. They are the co-authors of the recently released book The Power of Strategic Commitment: Achieving Extraordinary Results Through TOTAL Alignment and Engagement. (AMACOM, July 2009). Leibner and Mader are frequently interviewed by the media and have been quoted in Forbes, Executive Decision and The Ragan Report.
For more information, please view a copy of their online press kit at http://leibnerandmader.sterlingmarketinggroup.com/index.html.
About The Power of Strategic Commitment
The Power of Strategic Commitment comes complete with diagnostic tools, assessment instruments and processes for crafting a bold and compelling strategic future. It empowers executives to bring together the total sum of their team's knowledge, experience and creativity to move their organization to the next level.
Using practical tools, proven methods and meaningful case studies from a broad range of global companies, Leibner and Mader teach their clients how to:
• Gain buy-in from all levels of the company• Create a commitment-inspiring rewards system -- without breaking the bank• Hire fully-engaged employees right from the start• Include and involve everyone in owning their piece of the organization's future
For more information on the book, please view the Web site: http://www.strategiccommitment.com/.
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