Strategy Activation

Storytelling is a leadership blind spot that has been facing the business world for the past 20 years. It’s time to address this.

Organizational change is never simple, and an M&A is no exception. To maximize success, follow these 5 tips that focus on culture, your people & communications.

While many strategies fail, the truth is that with some thoughtful planning and time, you too can pave the way for strategy activation success.

What drove your people to perform in the past is no longer the same. Amidst a workforce evolution, leaders need to evolve their own thinking.

Smart decision-making creates countless benefits for your business. Do you have an effective process in place?

Without the right behaviors, strategy execution will fail every single time. Leaders must go first by walking the walk and talking the talk.

If you want your organization to succeed leaders must tell the truth about their reality, discuss the tough issues, and commit to changing negative behaviors.

Many companies share the same core strategy. The differentiator is the ability to execute – getting aligned on a vision & getting the priorities right. 

Change is rarely, if ever, easy. Here are four fundamental steps to help your people get ready to create change for your business.

For an organization to conceptualize and roll out transformative change, it needs every single employee on board. Click for tips.

Preparing for change? Here are three tips for leaders to mitigate risks and help prepare their people for the road ahead. Change isn't easy, but yes, it is achievable!

When leaders fail to address the cultural changes needed, they see limited success in attaining the strategic benefits of the M&A.

The goal of a virtual event is to create a directed experience that you can control, people can unify around, and everyone will remember.

Did you know that people don’t resist change? It's true. They resist being told to change or being changed by someone else. This is an important distinction and one that leaders must take to heart.

Strategy without execution is meaningless, and execution without engagement is impossible. Is your company actually executing your strategy through people.

Traditional gender roles still hold firm in most financial institutions and large purchasing processes and experiences. However, in today’s highly competitive market, financial services organizations need to take practical steps to serve female investors more effectively. The institutions that win with (millennial) female investors will be unstoppable.

Is your organization establishing new health & safety rules as a result of COVID-19? This is an opportunity to create a long-term competitive advantage.

When two multi-billion dollar companies merged, they realized they needed to meld two significantly different company cultures to ensure future success.

Why is the deployment and execution of strategy so tough? Because most new strategies bring conflict, adversity, and inconsistency – out of necessity.

There is a better way to make decisions – a way to take different perspectives into account and to arrive collaboratively at a suitable solution.

Organizations need to implement changes to navigate tremendous challenges. Communicating effectively has never been more critical than it is right now.

If your people don’t trust your leadership, then navigating a crisis and delivering future success become nearly impossible.

While we certainly value in-person gatherings, you can’t afford to put events on hold even if you can’t be together. Your business and strategy can’t wait.

The best chief strategy officers I engage with today are not only analytically brilliant, but they are also world-class storytellers and architects of change plans to evolve culture or build new organizational capabilities.

We asked members of the workforce to name their organization’s top priority for 2020. Are you helping your people connect the dots of your strategy ?

My role, leading our CX team, gave me insight into how easy it is to initiate organizational change and how hard it is to sustain real change.

Bridge the gap from strategy creation to strategy activation, and achieve strategic results. This paper provides tips to overcome common strategy mistakes.

Creating change mindsets during financial downturns requires doubling down on engaging your people in your strategic priorities to maintain focus.

What kind of a decision-maker are you? Whether individual contributors, managers, or executive leaders, the decision-making process is very important.

Organizational change is unavoidable. Here are four tips to keep operations running smoothly amid change.

While I don’t believe I have to all the answers on all things business and leadership related, I am certain about one thing

The times when we need to be the most conscious of others are when things get chaotic, stress levels run high, and deadlines loom. But, this rarely happens.

Change requires commitment, focus and a process that gives every single person in the company a connection to the strategy.

We’ve all heard the phrase “a picture is worth a thousand words.” We have found that to be exceedingly true in business. As a matter of fact

Another ringing endorsement that visualization promotes retention came from the most recent Jeopardy! Champ. Contestant James Holzhauer

Despite the well-documented power of storytelling, most leaders are just awful at telling stories. Learn seven ways to become a stellar storyteller now.

The fate of your strategy hinges on everyone in your organization getting their heads, hearts, and minds around a new way – the needed culture change.

Want that next strategic initiative to be a success? It all comes down to focus. That means setting your priorities. Not an easy task.

Sustainment is the single secret to lasting change and can become the business strategy that helps your organization achieve the impossible.

When we understand why we gather – to acknowledge, to learn, to challenge, to change – we learn how to organize gatherings that are relevant and memorable

The purpose of strategic planning is not to make plans. It is to change the way that we think and act. It requires changing behaviors.

I grew up in a town of about 7,000 people in metro Detroit – a typical example of urban sprawl, whilst holding that “hometown vibe” close to the heart.

We know successful strategy execution is not easy. We have all read the articles, blogs, white papers, case studies that shout at us that strategy often

Jim Haudan, and Rich Berens of Root Inc. detail 5 leadership blind spots that hinder employee engagement and innovation in the workplace.

Accountability improves our decision-making and information processing because we know in advance that we will have to answer others for our decisions.

How you handle change says a lot. To propel change successfully in your organization remember to focus on these important three key areas.

By engaging all employees in a discovery-based interactive experience, you can deploy your new strategy in an effective and sustainable way.

You have a new strategy and need employee engagement ideas? Combining metaphors, visualization and discussion enables your strategy to be a success.

No one remembers a memo, so why do we think they will create organizational change? Start making change stick them with visualization, data, and dialogue.

Every company has a story, which when told correctly can lead to great things. Here are three tips to use yours to inspire the change your company needs.

Everyone want to create positive change, especially at work. Here are 3 barriers to overcome or avoid to create change at work.

The purpose of strategic planning is not to make plans. It’s to change the way we think and act. If our newly formed visions and strategic plans

When designing the strategy deployment experience, it's important to imagine yourself in the customer's shoes.

Want to inspire strategy success? Well it's a lot like setting the table for Thanksgiving. It's all about the whole experience, and not just the turkey.

Tips and Tricks for developing a successful strategy development and execution plain in 2017.

Listening to and learning from your employees uncovers opportunities for your business and helps your leaders improve their performance management abilities

Arden Brion, Root’s managing director of healthcare, enjoys helping healthcare organizations engage their workforces in the execution of strategies

I am NOT a big fan of New Year’s Resolutions. With the best of intentions they are made to kick off the year with a set of goals or aspirations. But…they rarely have a plan that supports their long term success. What if this year, instead of drafting a list of promises you intend to … Continue reading “Sustainable Change – A Great Solution to the Failed New Year’s Resolution.”

No matter how great a leader is at building a smart strategy, telling a compelling story, or engaging people during a launch, hard-wiring change for the long term seems to be mission impossible. Just search the phrase “strategy execution failures” and you’ll find a hefty 858,000 Google results. Yes, almost a million links you can … Continue reading “The Truth About Why Your Dang Strategy Isn’t Working Again!”

Tackling strategic change/transformation is never easy – and tackling it without being fully prepared sets an organization up for failure. For more than 20 years we have worked with organizations of all types to support the strategy and change process. In that time, we have observed a few key steps that can be taken upfront … Continue reading “Organizing to Win – How to Set Up an Infrastructure for Strategy Success”

DuPont Pioneer leaders wanted to increase employee engagement with better clarity, alignment and focus on the company strategy, its process and growth plans

Paradox is important because new strategies get stuck in translation around a major paradox causing polarization instead of creating a platform for change

I recently viewed a story about Alan Alda, who you may remember is best known for the long-running M*A*S*H sitcom. He has been a frequent host of science-rich programs that focus on communicating science concepts in ways that kids can understand. Alda tells a story in which he recalls an exchange he had, at the … Continue reading “How Would Eleven-Year-Olds Judge the Explanation of Your Strategy?”

Visualization is probably one of the strongest assets any organization has in its arsenal and is a major competitive differentiator

What does student debt have to do with strategy execution? It is all about elevating your thinking and seeing the big picture as an interconnected system.

A people strategy is going to have a greater impact than a mere product launch. Learn why investing in your people is as important as a product launch.

The dawning of a new year is a time when many organizations look to push the execution of their strategies beyond its current level to the mythical “11”

When you try to do too much, nothing gets done. Seeing the big picture helps companies understand which business investments are important.

Most all of us had the opportunity to watch the extraordinary events on TV over the past three weeks.  We witnessed a people overturn 30 years of dictatorship in a mere 18 days.  I’m still in awe of the spirit and endurance that the people of Egypt showed the world, the sense of community they … Continue reading “What we can learn from the events in Egypt”

“We should not look back unless it is to derive useful lessons from past errors, and for the purpose of profiting by dearly bought experience.” George

You’ve likely heard the phrase, “Culture eats strategy for lunch.”  The idea behind this is that values and cultural norms in an organization are often much stronger than the strategy that gets communicated in PowerPoint decks from the company’s top leaders.   But what about pursuing growth?  Does strategy trump culture then?  How much of the … Continue reading “Strategy or Values? Yes!”

The biggest economic upheaval in 80 years is settling in. Most organizations have figured out that “waiting for things to get better” is not a viable

What do strategy, engagement, and culture have in common? These words are frequently used in the boardrooms of companies in Fortune 500 America

I’m fascinated with a new visual craze hitting photo circles called tilt-shift photography.  This is a technique where the lens is actually not directly attached to camera but separated by a “shiftable” lens or other homemade device.  It gives photos a blurred effect around all portions of the photo but the middle. This makes the items in focus … Continue reading “Tilt-shift Thinking…”

Ask every CEO if they want to execute strategy more effectively and the answer is always “Yes!” Next, ask every CEO how to ensure that

If you’ve ever worked in a large organization, you’ve probably experienced this scenario: The CEO presents a new strategy. It’s about world-class