1CMO

Growth strategy | Advisory | Force multiplier

Kimball Norup

Goodbye 2020, I Will NOT Miss You!

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“I never lose. I either win or learn.” – Nelson Mandela

For starters, wishing you and your family a very happy New Year.

For me personally this past year was extremely challenging. It was filled with professional and personal heartaches, along with some momentous positives. I will skip the details, but suffice it to say that in my lifetime I have never experienced the amount of stress, uncertainty, and angst that 2020 delivered.

Fortunately, every storm passes and the sun eventually emerges to shine again.

To say that I have gained a lot from 2020 is an understatement. This might sound horrible and insensitive, but in many respects, I am very thankful for the last 12 months. While I would not want to live through it again, I have learned and grown tremendously.

Here are some of the key lessons I learned.

Expect the Unexpected

So often in our personal and professional lives, we are surprised and caught off guard by an unexpected external force. Something we did not anticipate, or even imagine possible.

Whether it is an insensitive comment from a friend, a political move by a co-worker, losing a job, a direct assault on our business from a competitor, or, perhaps, even a global pandemic, the world of work is full of VUCA forces (volatility, uncertainty, complexity, uncertainty). These can cause a wide range of impacts from just “having a bad morning” to seriously jeopardizing your livelihood or the viability of your organization.

The best solution to any problem is always to prevent it from happening in the first place. While predicting unknowns is not always possible, developing a good situational awareness of your environment and marketplace is a great place to start.

You might be surprised, as I was, at how many “clues” you missed by rushing through your daily routine and not paying closer attention.

Developing a better understanding of your surroundings will help to better define possible threats. You can then begin to brainstorm their potential impacts, and your response, should they arise. This type of Scenario Planning is a key aspect of VUCA Strategic Planning, and doing it regularly will help to ensure you and your organization are more resilient against any threats.

External forces are very real. We cannot ignore them. However, we also cannot allow them to consume us.

When they hit us, we have to address them, learn from them, and then focus on moving forward.

Crisis Can Lead to Introspection

Another big lesson from all the VUCA forces that hit me this past year was this: The event does not define us. It is how we choose to respond that counts.

I have seen three common response patterns, and depending on the situation, each of them has merit:

  1. You can decide to hunker down and hide. Sometimes we get lucky and the storm will pass by leaving us unscathed. Unfortunately, for many issues in the world of work, hope is not a strategy, and the issue will still likely be there tomorrow.
  2. You can lash out. With the right strategy, fighting back can sometimes be effective. However, if you get it wrong, things can get messy in a hurry.
  3. Or, you can take it as a learning opportunity and figure out how to move on. Sometimes we have to accept the things we cannot change, and pivot.

There is a lot of value to be gained from detaching yourself (taking a neutral and objective view), reviewing what happened (being honest, not overstating it but also not sugarcoating it). This allows you the time and space to figure out what you could or should have done differently (if anything). Which hopefully will lead to internalizing the lesson (so you do not repeat the same mistake again), and then figuring out the plan to quickly move on.

Another lesson that 2020 taught me was I am often guilty of not taking enough time for introspection. I think it is a common executive ailment – everyone is so stretched for time, moving fast, and always focused on solving problems quickly. This merciless cycle does not afford the time we need to process and learn.

Like many professionals, the pandemic forced me to work from home and prevented any business travel since March. This has given me more time to think, to learn, and to strategize about the future than I have had in the past 20 years. As an added bonus, the time with family and a better work/life balance has been priceless.

Crisis can lead to healthy introspection, if you take the time to do it.

Introspection Leads to Reinvention

By allowing ourselves time for introspection, something magical happens. We not only gain clarity, but also a newfound confidence to revisit and challenge the status quo. I have found that the more profound the external force, the greater the potential opportunity for change.

As evidence, we do not need to look much further than what has happened in the world of work over the past 10 months. The global COVID-19 pandemic caused many organizations to make rapid and far-reaching changes to how they get work done. A few examples of this dynamic workforce and workplace reinvention:

  • As evidenced by the unprecedented spike in US unemployment, almost every organization cut headcount in 2020. While we can debate whether some organizations did not cut enough, and others perhaps cut too far, the reality is millions of jobs are likely not coming back in their prior form. Many of these roles will resurface as more flexible, contingent jobs.
  • Some industries (for example, travel) may never come back to the same pre-pandemic level, while others (for example, home delivery) will reach new highs.
  • In 2020 we proved that almost every white-collar role can effectively be accomplished working from home. Many studies I read actually showed an increase in productivity for these newly remote workers. As the pandemic recedes, it will be interesting to see what organizations decide to do with their remote workforces, and their need for traditional office space.
  • Many highly skilled professionals will take advantage of these radical changes in the workplace and reinvent their careers as experts for hire (like how I am helping some awesome growth minded organizations with my 1CMO Consulting services!), achieving new levels of career satisfaction and work/life balance.
  • The research firm Gartner, predicts that by 2024 only a quarter of workplace meetings will take place in person. The meteoric rise of virtual meetings will have far-reaching impacts. Not only eliminating the need for a lot of corporate real estate, but also changing the dynamic of field sales (and all the things that accompany it like business travel and entertainment!)
  • The Gartner Future of Sales 2025 report predicts that by 2025, 80% of B2B sales interactions between suppliers and buyers will occur in digital channels. In other words, not in person.

These are just a few examples of how organizations, and the individuals who work in them, have been forced to challenge their historical assumptions when confronted by a crisis. The ability to test different approaches, see what sticks, and then quickly pivot, is the winning approach.

Reinvention Leads to New Opportunity

I am looking forward to seeing what the year 2021 has in store.

As we begin slowly emerging from our pandemic-forced hibernation, my prediction is that there will be many new opportunities (both personal and professional) in the upcoming year, visible to those who are paying attention to their surroundings and actively looking for them!

My practice of growth strategy consulting is certain to benefit from a rising optimism in the markets. And I suspect many readers of this article will be able to say the same.

With that, I say one last goodbye to the year 2020. I am very thankful and blessed to have survived intact, but I will NOT miss you.

-Onward

Growth Leaders Love to Get Dirty

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“There may be people that have more talent than you, but there’s no excuse for anyone to work harder than you.” – Derek Jeter

Driving organizational growth is hard work.

It can be messy. Stressful. Full of uncertainty.

It is seldom easy. Nor is it ever free.

Leaders cannot just delegate growth. The best ones lead the charge, not from a cozy corner office, but out in the field.

I have found that the best growth leaders are the ones who dig in to the challenge right alongside their teams.

They get out of the building, and spend time in the market.

They also show up ready to do the work.

Put simply, they get dirty.

Leadership is Hard Work

There is no mistaking that growing an organization takes hard work, regardless of the industry or market.

Let’s be honest. If it were easy, then everybody would be doing it. Right?!

Peter Daland, the former USC and Olympic swimming coach put it this way, “The secret to swimming is not how far you swim, and it’s not how hard you swim. The secret to swimming is how far you are willing to swim hard.”

I think this same sentiment rings true for leadership. Great leaders are willing to work hard. They don’t give up. They keep going.

Many people mistakenly look for the easy way out. Unfortunately, it is very rare to find a single tactic or “hack” that drives organizational growth. As I shared in an earlier blog article, there is usually no silver bullet to growth.

Driving growth takes courage, commitment, perseverance, and an unwavering belief in your vision of the future.

Driving growth also takes a willingness to be make mistakes (and to learn from them!)

Even if you do the wrong thing, at least it is something. You will learn from it. Moreover, you can now cross it off the list of things to try! And, you will then be in a position to pivot towards a better solution.

A leader who does not do the work will not get the benefit of these lessons. They will eventually reach a point where they fail. However, a hard working leader who also works smart will eventually find a way to overcome whatever obstacle lies in their path.

One thing is as certain for businesses as it is for human beings: A sedentary life does not lead to healthy outcomes. You have to get out and move!

You have to get dirty.

Tips on How to Lead Smarter

In addition to hard work, the real secret is you also have to lead smart.

What do I mean by this?

Here are a few examples of great growth leader strategies and behaviors. I have witnessed them in practice and tried to exemplify them in my growth leadership roles:

  • Lead From the Front – Growth leaders are visible. They spend a lot of time with their teams, and out in the market. For example, the CEO participating in sales pitches. The CMO writing copy or dissecting web analytics. The Head of Sales carrying a quota and actively coaching their team in the field. The bottom line is you can’t credibly lead what you can’t (or won’t) do yourself.
  • Communicate Frequently and Clearly – Growth leaders are not only visible to their teams. They communicate with their teams frequently and clearly. The goal is not to just speak to be heard. For growth leaders it is always to speak to be understood.
  • Always Looking Over the Horizon – Growth leaders are always asking “what if” questions of their teams to stress test strategies and plans. Helping them to identify potentially adverse scenarios and thinking through the right approach.
  • Convert Ideas Into Executable Plans – In growth companies, ideas are cheap. Everything looks like an opportunity. However, it is a trap. Ideas are free. They are actually easy to find. It is execution that is difficult. Growth leaders focus on helping their teams convert great ideas into achievable plans. Execution is everything.
  • Push Hard, But Not Unrealistically – To drive growth you have to be aggressive, which includes setting aggressive goals and timelines. However, they must also be realistic. The quickest way to burn out a team is to push them to do something that is unachievable. Nobody likes being set up to fail.
  • Do It Right the First Time – There is an old expression that “haste makes waste.” This is an all too common outcome in growth initiatives. Remember the US Navy SEALS mantra that slow is smooth, smooth is fast.
  • Delegate, But Never Abdicate – Many leaders get this wrong. They think they are delegating a task or responsibility, but in reality, they are abdicating. What’s the difference? Abdicating is telling a team member to do something, but not making sure they know what to do and never following up. It is a cancer in any organization. Delegation, on the other hand, is telling a team member to do something, and then verifying they know what to do, offering insight or education as needed, providing encouragement, and following up to check on the status.
  • Provide Emotional Balance – When the team is stressed out, growth leaders demonstrate calm. When the team is out of energy, growth leaders share their passion. When the team doesn’t know what to do next, growth leaders show the way.
  • Provide Support – Growth leaders always focus on removing obstacles that prevent their teams from moving forward. Sometimes this translates into proving extra resources. Other times it might mean helping the team to solve problems. Sometimes it is literally lending a helping hand.Growth leaders never underestimate the team building and camaraderie that comes from an “all hands on deck” exercise to solve an urgent problem or meet a deadline.
  • Check Their Ego at the Door – Just because someone has a C-level title that does not automatically make him or her an effective leader. The quickest and easiest way to destroy any hope of achieving a growth strategy is to be so arrogant that you are unwilling to roll up your sleeves and get dirty.

Parting Thoughts on Getting Dirty

In my years of being a growth leader and member of a number of management teams, I have on more than one occasion witnessed individuals who think that once they ascend to a leadership role they don’t have to do “real work” anymore.

This dynamic inevitably leads to a rotten organization. Because even if the leader does not feel that way, you can be sure their team does!

Of course, growth leaders do have to take part in meetings with other executives and the board of directors. They also have to manage the functional departments to keep the organization running. However, the best growth leaders recognize that it is never a choice of doing one over the other, it is the decision to do both.

You cannot effectively lead an organization from the ivory tower…you have to be out in the market. In the dirt with your team.

There are no shortcuts.

In conclusion, there is one last important aspect to getting dirty. It is very gratifying, and is often the place where growth leaders find the most joy in their role. As a good friend of mine, and fellow growth leader, is fond of saying: the fun is in the mud!

-Onward

Six Business Growth Superpowers

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Leaders who want to drive growth for their organization have an almost limitless number of strategies and tactics at their disposal.

This virtually unlimited choice can be overwhelming for many. Reaching the point of paralysis for some.

Fortunately, I have found that a few “macro” strategies consistently rise to the top. These proven approaches have nearly universal applicability. Regardless of your industry, size, or growth challenge, deploying these strategies will create a solid foundation for growth. When you get them right, they become success enablers for more specific tactics and strategies to follow.

I call them the six business growth superpowers.

Here they are:

#1 – Have a Plan

This will sound crazy, but to get started on your growth journey it is important to first define the growth you want to achieve for your organization and have a basic idea of how you might try to accomplish it.

Such simple advice, yet very few follow it. Most people just dive right in, and start firing away. This “ready, fire, aim” approach often results in failure, wasted time and resources.

A better approach is to spend a little time to develop a basic plan of attack. This includes a quick survey of your strengths and weaknesses, and an assessment of the market(s) where you compete.

This important groundwork will provide direction and focus for you, and your team.

It does not have to be perfect. In fact, I can promise you it probably never will be. That is okay, because you will quickly learn and refine your approach based on real-world feedback from your market.

As part of your plan, you should also set a target. This definition of what you want to achieve will become your guiding “North Star” as you move forward in developing a more comprehensive growth strategy and plan, and will help you to measure progress along the way.

The great news is you do not need all the answers to get started. Pick a direction. Any direction, even if proven wrong, is better than no direction at all. You will quickly learn what works, and pivot away from what does not.

Ultimately, the power of having a plan for growth is it helps to prevent tactical and reactive thinking. Instead of “shooting from the hip” at every real or perceived opportunity that comes into your field of vision, you can selectively focus on those that are in alignment with what you are trying to achieve and likely to deliver positive results.

Considering if something brings you closer to your growth goal, allows you to be proactive instead of reactive.

#2 – Know Your Value

Many company leaders who are seeking growth do not understand what makes their organization special or unique in the marketplace.

This absolute cardinal sin will effectively prevent any effective marketing or sales from taking place.

If you cannot clearly articulate what makes your product(s) and/or service(s) different or demonstrably better than your competition, then how can you expect to be successful?

It is important to remember that your prospects always have many options, including the dreaded “no decision”. To grow you must always be connecting the dots between your unique solution, and your buyer’s pain, problem, or potential opportunity.

This is where sales happen, and client loyalty is born.

#3 – Understand Your Buyer

Once you understand and can clearly articulate your value proposition, you need to answer an important question: For whom?

By definition, in order to grow you are going to need to sell something. There are only 4 basic approaches to increase sales.

Regardless of which one, or combination of these strategies you choose, you will need to know who your buyer is.

The best way to define this is to think about what your Ideal Client Profile (ICP) looks like. For B2B sales, this means what industries, sizes of companies, and geographies are the perfect match for what you are selling? Also, within each of these organizations, who are you selling to? Create a profile (persona) that defines each individual.

The final step in understanding your future client is to create a model of your buyer’s journey. What triggers their need? How do they search for you? Decide to buy? How can you help them?

A great way to really understand your buyer is to think about their “job to be done” – What are they responsible for? What keeps them up at night? How can you help them to be successful?

The answers to these important questions will help you to tailor your value proposition message and close more deals.

Most go-to-market organizations focus only on making a sale. Unfortunately, too few organizations have a focus on client success. To drive growth, keep your eye on your buyer. Help to make them successful from the time they are a prospect to the time they are a client. You will sell more, and grow quicker.

#4 – Make It Easy

The “secret sauce” of high growth companies is a relentless focus on their clients.

The smart ones also think deeply about their process to gain new clients. They focus on optimizing the marketing and sales process, and making the buyer experience easier and more attractive for prospects.

This go-to-market mindset requires you to ask questions and translate the answers into a better understanding of the typical buyer’s journey and making every step as easy and frictionless as possible.

How can you make it easy for customers to buy from you? A few proven suggestions:

  • Educate them on how to buy your product or service. What are the key elements they should consider? Where have others failed?
  • Provide them with insights that help them to do their jobs better.
  • Walk them through a typical buying process, what should they expect moving forward?

Many growth leaders forget that sales is a two-way dance. Yes, you need to focus on making it easy for your buyer. However, what about the seller? Smart GTM organizations also try to make it easy on their sales team. Some ideas:

  • Revisit your sales process. Can you economize any steps? Are there selling tools (case studies, calculators, etc) that can help your sales team to be more effective?
  • Review your pricing and contracting process. Can you make it easier for your sales team to generate quotes?
  • Can you standardize as much of your contracting and approvals process as possible. Not only will your sales team appreciate the reduction in “thrash”, so will your prospects!

When you get it right, the go-to-market process becomes a virtuous cycle:

  • GTM Strategy enables effective marketing.
  • Marketing enables sales.
  • Sales enables client success.
  • Client success enables retention, expansion, referrals, and new growth!

#5 – Embrace VUCA

If the year 2020 has taught us anything it is that we live in stressful and rapidly changing world.

There is simply no escape from the many powerful VUCA forces in every industry and market across the globe. We must all get comfortable with VUCA, and learn how to quickly make decisions with less than perfect information.

Since we know they exist, and are not going away anytime soon, there is no excuse for not understanding and embracing these forces so that you can effectively counter them. There are many proven approaches for dealing with VUCA. Understanding your market, and developing a deep situational awareness is an important first step.

Perhaps the best strategy for dealing with the change and uncertainty in your market is to embrace it. Instead of allowing the market to dictate change, be proactive and lead the market. Be a catalyst for change. Adaptability is the antidote. Without it you are dead.

#6 – Take Action

Along with unpredictable VUCA forces, almost every organization is experiencing a faster pace of play in their market.

Everything from product lifecycles, to time to market, to delivery expectations, to innovations are accelerating. These trends are driven by technology, globalization, and aggressive competitors…all things out of our direct control. However, that does not mean we cannot manage them.

Organizations must learn how to accommodate this new faster pace. As referenced above, removing friction is certainly part of the answer. So is focusing on agility. Constantly pushing for doing things quicker, and better, at a lower cost.

What should growth leaders do? For starters, get out of the building, and into the market. They must also encourage their teams to embrace the ethos of MFGSD. By taking action and pushing through more cycles, you will gain the benefit of more learning opportunities!

To Infinity, and Beyond!

Any business growth problem or opportunity often has many different possible solutions to consider. Evaluating this vast “toolbox” of options is certainly part of the challenge (and for practitioners, part of the fun!) in developing and executing growth strategy.

There are many risks to avoid. Perhaps the most glaring is diving in without any direction or plan.

Knowing where you are today, and where you want to go tomorrow, is very powerful.

Developing a growth strategy and a resulting plan forces you to think deeply about your business, your operating environment, and the opportunities in front of you. With clarity around your value and your buyers, you can focus on selling more and leading the market instead of being a victim to external forces.

Take action today. Growth will be your reward.

-Onward

Why Your Biggest Competitor is “No Decision”

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“A business unit needs to decide what need it aims to satisfy in what group of people and with what value proposition that distinguishes the business from its competitors.” – Philip Kotler

The world of B2B sales is complex, difficult, and in our hyper-competitive global marketplace, it grows more challenging every day.

Every industry is undergoing transformation in some form, with many aggressive competitors chasing the same deals, and an overwhelming number of communications channels bombarding prospects with messages.

Each company has overloaded buyers, scarce resources, internal politics, and complex buying processes.

To make matters worse, the further up the enterprise food chain you go, the more challenging it becomes…resulting in longer and more complex sales cycles.

Bottom line: It is not easy to be a B2B buyer, or seller, in any market.

Unfortunately, because of this complexity many deals result in “no decision” – where the buyer ends up choosing to do nothing, rather than trust any seller or potential solution to satisfy their need.

It does not have to be this way.

While there is no single “silver bullet to growth“, there is a proven strategy smart sellers can use to increase their odds of converting B2B prospects to closed-won clients.

Even though this strategic approach is not difficult, the vast majority of B2B go-to-market organizations do not do it.

Why?

Because it requires them to think.

The Complexity of B2B Sales

Here are a few statistics I have heard over the last 12 months that illustrate how challenging and complex today’s B2B sales environment really is:

  • 90% of B2B web searchers have not selected a brand before starting their search. (Status Labs)
  • 57% of the average buyers journey is completed before there is ANY contact with a seller. (Gartner, CEB – Corporate Executive Board)
  • 74.6% of B2B sales cycles to new customers take at least 4 months to close, with almost half (46.4%) taking 7 months or more. 12-15 months is not unheard of for complex solutions. (Marketing Charts)
  • 10.2 people are now involved in the average enterprise buying decision. This is your “buying committee.” (CEB) – If you look at the deals at the end of your pipeline, how many members have you identified for each?
  • 40% of buyer journeys result in no decision. (CEB)

This is not a pretty picture if you are involved with B2B marketing or sales.

How do you navigate through this?

The answer is with better clarity and insight about your offering, and your buyers.

Clarity and Insight Lead to Better Messaging

There are three important insights you need to get started.

  1. First, you need absolute clarity on your offering – the products and/or services you sell. What are the benefits? The strengths/weaknesses of your solution versus alternatives? What results will your offering deliver? This is your value proposition.
  2. The next question to be answered is, what types of organization is ideally suited to be your next client? Will your solution work for any size company in any industry in any geography, or is it more targeted? Define your answer in the form of an Ideal Client Profile (often called ICP in biz dev circles!)
  3. Finally, get clarity on who your typical buyer is (or more often, the members of the buying group)? Begin to develop a “persona” profile for each, highlighting their typical demographics. You should also begin to think about how you could make the value proposition of your offering more relevant to each persona.

With these insights in hand, you can now begin to think about your messaging.

Consider the Buyers Point of View

Why is messaging so important? Because messaging is where we tailor the value proposition of our offering to something each individual buyer actually cares about, and is motivating enough for them to take action.

Until we do this, there is likely not going to be any sale.

A great way to begin thinking about this is to answer the following question: What is the buyer’s job to be done?

Ask this for each persona you have identified in your typical sales cycle. Then you can begin to think about their challenges. Their fears. Their concerns. What is preventing them from doing their job?

This will point you in the right direction.

Can you identify the specific pain, problem, or potential opportunity that your product or service will solve for them?

Sales happen when you can clearly demonstrate how your offering uniquely:

  • Removes or reduces pain
  • Fixes a problem
  • Creates new capability or opportunity

Once you understand the “job to be done” by your buyer and the client organization, then you can begin to shape your offering to win.

With this deep understanding of your buyer, you can position your product/service, and develop the appropriate messaging to communicate the unique benefits you deliver.

Without it, you are competing with every other loud voice in your market.

The Only Solution

Always remember that in every deal you are first competing against the opportunity cost of the buyer doing nothing at all.

Many organizations and decision makers arrive at a “no decision” outcome because the “pain of the same” appears easier, less expensive, less risky, or less disruptive than making a change.

You will lose to the status quo, the dreaded “no decision”, every single time if you do not clearly demonstrate the unique benefits of your products and/or services, and inspire them to take action.

As sellers, we have to show buyers that our solution will uniquely remove their pain, solve their problem, or deliver new value to the organization.

Unless you connect the dots between your offering’s value proposition and the buyer’s “job to be done,” and convince them that your solution is their only solution; you will likely not be successful.

Developing clarity on your value proposition, ideal client, and buyer’s “job to be done” are your secret strategy to developing effective messaging and greater B2B sales success.

-Onward

The Essence of Great Strategy

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“The essence of strategy is choosing what not to do.” – Michael Porter

In order to grow a company it is vital to have crystal clarity on where you are going, what you are trying to achieve, and why. Only then, can you effectively execute and manage your limited resources to achieve the desired objectives.

To help you navigate is the purpose, and great value, of creating a VUCA Strategic Plan.

A thoughtful strategic plan provides focus for the organization. It defines a framework, and the rationale, for saying “no” to all but the most important and impactful activities…those things that will bring your closer to achieving your long-term objectives.

Everything else can, and should be, ignored.

Beware: In today’s dynamic and uncertain marketplace, there are many tempting distractions. You decide to pursue them at your peril.

This advice is much easier to say, than do.

Here is a recent example from my consulting practice…

Chasing Every Opportunity is Not a Viable Strategy

I had an interesting conversation the other day with a company leader who was frustrated by the lack of progress his organization has made in the marketplace.

Despite a proven solution and a solid team, this CEO felt they not executing on the company’s growth objectives, or living up to their potential.

He was questioning if they had the right strategy in place.

A good question for the CEO to be asking! However, it is hard to tell without asking a lot more questions…

With some more discussion, the real problem began to emerge.

They have grown by being really nimble and opportunistic. Literally saying yes, and devoting resources, to every viable market opportunity that has come their way. There have been many.

Over time, they have deviated from their strategic plan, tweaked their solution, added customizations, chased after deals that didn’t really fit their ideal client profile, entered into hasty partnerships…among other things. Always because there was potential revenue at the end.

The implicit strategy they have been operating under is to treat everything as an opportunity, and to leave no potential opportunity untouched.

This agile approach worked fine, until it didn’t.

They have progressed beyond the scrappy startup phase, and failed to convert on the biggest market opportunity in front of them. Now the market (and more focused competition) are passing them by.

After politely I pointed out to this CEO that their business strategy, essentially, had been to chase every potential opportunity that came their way, he asked a provocative question in frustration:

“Well, then what is strategy?”

Strategy Defined

I began with my standard definition.

In the realm of VUCA Strategic Planning, “strategy” has a central and extremely important role to play. To ensure the highest probability of success, company leaders must develop and articulate a clear strategy to follow. It will define the approach, or the “how”, that individual contributors and teams use to do their work and achieve their short-term objectives.

The VUCA Strategic Plan is built around the execution of the chosen strategy. Ultimately, successful execution of the strategy will propel the organization towards achieving its long-term goals.

This leads to a simple definition of strategy: 

The approach that will guide the team on “how” to achieve the short-term objectives that move the organization from its current state towards achieving its long-term goals.

I could tell that my simple definition was not resonating with this CEO. He kept talking about all the potentially viable opportunities he wanted to pursue.

I then stopped him in his tracks with this clarification:

“The most difficult, and critical, part of strategy is not choosing what to do. It is choosing what NOT to do. You can’t do everything.”

The Essence of Strategy

Strategy execution requires that leaders constantly make decisions.

Great leaders are often defined by their ability to make decisions quickly between competing choices with less than perfect information, and then taking action.

Leaders decide where the organization should go and what to do. By default, they must also decide where not to go and what not to do. All the while recognizing that you must make a choice, you cannot do both.

Michael Porter said it best, “Strategy is about making choices, trade-offs; it’s about deliberately choosing to be different. The essence of strategy is choosing what not to do.”

Strategy execution is about making choices, trade-offs and choosing what not to do. There are only so many objectives and results that a person (or an organization!) can focus on at any given time. Focus by definition means deciding not to spend time on some things so that others get the attention they need.

The late Jack Welch, former CEO of General Electric summed this up nicely, “Strategy is simply resource allocation. When you strip away all the noise, that’s what it comes down to. Strategy means making clear cut choices about how to compete.  You cannot be everything to everybody, no matter what the size of your business or how deep its pockets.”

Great advice from a business legend.

A Good Strategy Litmus Test

So, how do you know when you have a good strategy?

In some cases, you will not know until after you have made meaning progress towards, or achieved, your long-term objectives.

In the meantime, one useful barometer is that a good business strategy requires you to say “no” more often than you say “yes.”

What do I mean by this?

Over the course of time there will be customers that you are not going to serve, activities that you are not going to do, and services/products that you will not offer. You will say “no” to many things.

In business strategy, choosing what not to do is equally important.

Each business strategy should also have a section where it clearly states the things you are not going to do.

The Key Message

The conversation with this leader ended with me reinforcing the key message:

The essence of strategy is to define an objective and pick a direction, and then take actions that are designed to get you there. This inevitably involves making many decisions along the way and saying “no” to many of the options you are presented with.

Pick a direction, make a plan, and take action. And, most importantly, don’t get distracted along the way by things that might take you off course.

Pretty good advice, right?!

-Onward