Becoming a Fine-tuned Business Machine

Your business should operate like a fine-tuned machine, like a slick piece of technology. Consider that statement and it
s ramifications. What if your people were all rowing in the same direction, in tune and with clear focus? That is where the Alignment Model of Strategic Planning is used.

The overall purpose of the model is to ensure strong alignment among the organization's mission and its resources to effectively operate the organization. This model is useful for organizations that need to fine-tune strategies or find out why they are not working. An organization might also choose this model if it is experiencing a large number of issues around internal efficiencies.

Think of your business as an advanced machine or technology with many moving parts that is always changing due to key environmental factors and its human elements. The challenge is to fine-tune the machine and engage the resources to achieve effectiveness and efficiencies for positive results.

If we used technical documents as a reference, words like resolution, parameters, amplitude, frequency and reliability would be used to describe the boundaries around operations. These are all great words and can easily be aligned into the business thinking for long-term strategic impact. A deeper look into these words reveals an interesting business perspective.

Resolution: This is a degree of sharpness and the determination to act upon something that you have decided to do. You do it with resolve. It is never too late to fine-tune your resolution or to make a decision on a change or course of action. Consider writing down what it is you want to do and create the determination to make it happen. Just do it!

Parameters: This is a variable that must have a specific value during the execution of a procedure. It usually has limits or boundaries or guidelines - for example, the basic parameters of a technological setting or an organizational policy or process. Like a technological setting, we all have parameters that we live by within our professional lives. As business leaders you should know the parameters by which you and the business operate. It is important that processes and people align to business parameters.

Amplitude: This refers to greatness of size; it is the magnitude, fullness, the breadth or the range. To what level will you work to? How loud are you expressing what it is you are wanting or willing to do? If you want to be successful, tell someone. Express your greatness, the magnitude and range that you are willing to go to. Figure out your greatness and grow your amplitude.

Frequency: This is the rate of occurrence, as in the number of periods or regularly occurring events of any given unit of time. How often do you do what you do? What is your consistency level? In order to achieve your resolution within the parameters that are set and within the amplitude you have expressed, what is the desired frequency? Frequency is important to your success. You must practice frequency of engaged and focused positive actions every single day.

Reliability: By definition, reliability is the extent to which a system or human element can be counted on. This measure can relate to achievement, accuracy or honesty. Reliability is truly about trust. In a systems world, reliability would simply mean that it does not break down that often. How reliable are you and your people and can it be measured within the parameters that have been set for strategic purposes.

Alignment models for strategic planning seek to optimize efficiency and effectiveness, fine tuning the business environment for the best possible positive results. If we use technology measurements as the benchmarks for understanding how a system, an organization and the human element should work, then we can see that certain criteria needs to be considered. Ultimately we all want our business and its people to operate successfully. The challenge is to get aligned and make it happen.

In what way do you need to focus and fine tune your business for greater success? Contact me for a 30 minute discussion about what you might be able to do. 

What CEOs Want - - 8 Essential Management Team Attributes

Have you ever wondered what CEOs really want? What does a CEO expect from his/her organization, its senior team and the individual players? Generally it can be summed up in two words: creative alignment.
CEOs want team members who are creatively aligned and able to:

1. Handle Stress Effectively
Stress can be good. Stress can be bad. It depends on the type of stress. Being able to recover from stress in a fluid and adaptive environment becomes a stand out point for the management team. Stress triggers can negatively impact the creative alignment ability of the team. Being demoralized in any of your failures is not a good omen for success. Learning adaptive behaviours is important.

2. Hone their Risk Radars
This is a tough one. There is always a balancing act when it comes to risk. From the CEO’s perspective, senior management shouldn’t play it safe, nor should they live on the edge. There has to be a balance. The senior team must be keen on introducing new approaches with a tinge of risk. If the senior team are safe players then they provide little if any advantage in an accelerated world.

3. Build Positive Stakeholder Relationships
The entire management team has to realize that they are the business ambassadors internally and externally. All eyes are on them all the time. No CEO can afford to have a management team member that is a nay-sayer, who engages in us-versus-them language or is conflict prone. An engaged and creatively aligned management team knows that adjustments must be made for the good of the organization.

4. Create New Business Models
The senior team needs to get along and be the advisors to the CEO. There is little time for isolationism and individual egos. If the management team is unable to create new business models to move the business to new heights, the CEO and the company will be immensely disappointed in its ineffective movement.

5. Establish Creative Productivity Gains
Every CEO wants their management team to be innovative. The team must bring productivity to the business by way of increased effectiveness and efficiency. You must be proactive and scan the business environment for improvement opportunities. The management team’s ability to foster people and business growth is paramount to its success.

6. Take Business Routines Seriously
A good routine is always good for an organization. Eighty percent of the company’s work can be pre-established while the other twenty percent is always reserved for emergencies, rush jobs and responses. Getting the established processes in place and ensuring that other teams adapt to the routines of the organization is part of what makes things better.

7. March to a Mission
Management teams must creatively align themselves with the needs of the organization. CEOs are constantly asking, “What are the three to five things on the strategic agenda of the organization?” and “What is the management team doing to make it happen?” The CEO has every right to expect the management team to be on mission. The ability to creatively align means to be purposeful.

8. Invest in the Success of Others
Action speaks louder than words. As a management team, the ability to invest in others is an important recipe for success. When it comes right down to it, the most valuable asset of the organization is its people. Today’s organizations cannot afford to lose or have its intellectual capital treated disrespectfully. It is management’s responsibility to ensure they make the right investments in people.

Good CEOs know that if the individual players on the team are creatively aligned they will row in the same direction, at the same speed, with the same consistency. They will also find solutions and adjust to circumstances as needed. From a talent management perspective, that spells success. But you knew this, didn’t you!

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Sometimes we need something more. Consider what it is your need? Provide me a question. I will create a mini-2 minute video to answer your question and send it to you. Connect with me at Richard Lannon can be reached at info@braveworld.ca or www.braveworld.ca. Put Question Everything Video in the subject line. 

7 Steps to Kick-Start Your Strategic Planning Process

Strategic planning is an exercise in gathering and documenting information about the past, present and future of your business. Strategic planning helps determine where you want to go over the next few years, how you are going to get there and how to recognize when you've arrived.

One of the more common strategic planning approaches is Basic Strategic Planning (BSP). BSP uses a triangle approach and seeks to align strategic agenda items with the tactical reality of the organization.

Starting from the top, BSP includes the following steps:

1. Identify your mission statement. It is amazing how many organizations don't take the time to develop this statement. A mission statement is foundational to all strategic planning work. An effective mission statement describes what the company does, provides insight into client value and captures the essence of your company.

2. Create a vision of the future. A vision statement should look to the future. After all, you can't get to where you want to go unless you know where you want to go. Think ahead to three to five years from now and write your story. What is it that your organization has achieved? Tighten that story into a clear crisp sentence and share it.

3. Develop core values and guiding principles. Core values and guiding principles are foundational to your entire organization. Guiding principles are a set of accepted guidelines formed by the business that capture how your people act, work, make decisions, set priorities and conduct themselves. It is imperative to set and communicate core values and principles or else they will set themselves over time through employee habits.

4. Create long-term goals and smart objectives. Goals are general statements outlining what you want to achieve to meet your mission and vision and address any issues you are facing. For each and every goal it is important to identify strategies to achieve them. Objectives should be SMART; that means specific, measurable, attainable, realistic, and time bound. It is important that you make a distinction between long-term goals and smart objectives for those goals.

5. Establish an action roadmap with timelines. An action roadmap is a visual representation of your strategic planning items. It includes high-level agenda items, initiatives, champions and key elements. It includes the key areas that your organization will focus on in order to achieve its goals and objectives.

6. Build a communication plan. Communication plans should not be complicated and should be shared within your organization. It is important that time is spent determining the best approach for getting people informed as to what is planned and ensuring that they know impacts of not achieving the objectives. Consider printed plans, maps, high-level visuals, town hall sessions, etc. It is all about communication. Be visual, be creative.

7. Establish an implementation and monitoring plan. This is important to be successful. Organizations and teams fail because they don't assign a top-notch resource to put together an implementation plan. Consider using a highly-skilled program manager or director to translate the strategic plan into tactical reality. Ensure that the rules of engagement are established and build a strong monitoring process that engages people in open dialogue centred around the actions that must be taken to be successful.

Strategic planning is an important part of every organization's success. There are key elements that must go into strategic planning; if you do not have all the elements to start with, then you must start with the basic strategic planning process (BSP). Everything that you do as an organization will come from your strategic plan. This includes enhanced sales, improved business processes, inventory controls, or market advancement. The list of options is huge. We don't plan to fail, we just fail to plan.

What do you do to make sure your company has a road map and stays to the plan? It would be great to know. Contact me and we can discuss for 30 minutes what you need to do to ensure things are moving forward. info@braveworld.ca 



By Richard Lannon

The Changing Tides of Time

Over the next 10 years, 200,000 small business owners in Canada alone will turn 65 and want to retire. This number does not include their employees, mid to large businesses, corporations and public organizations. When you add all of those together this clearly becomes a critical issue with major impacts and ramifications.

As our workforce changes and becomes more diverse, the general thinking on talent and people resources is changing as well. While senior employees and managers are still essential to organizational success, there is now wide-spread recognition that improved performance depends on the acquisition, development, engagement and deployment of new talent.

For organizations to adapt to the changing tides of time, they must embrace talent management as a key business focus. Talent management helps identify the key strategies needed to address the aging workforce, retirement needs, changes in competitiveness and workforce diversity. In savvy organizations, talent management has become essential for survival.

The question you should now ask yourself is this: what is your organization doing about the changing tides of time? Here are three talent management steps to help:

1. Preparation is the Key to Success
This starts with knowing your facts. Firstly, ensure sure you have the right resources, materials, context and tools to properly assess your situation. The first stages of planning and preparation involve identifying priorities, establishing direction and reviewing resources, communications and engagement. Outlining your organization’s current position and future goals in relation to people resources will help you develop a talent management plan that is linked to the business strategy, job needs and the future.

You will also want to determine your readiness through benchmarking, assessments, future thinking and establishing focus/implementation approaches. You need to align with your business plan, assign the right people to work on the issues, review your processes and tools, engage in project planning and ensure administrative competencies are in place.

2. Identify the Essentials and Communicate Future Plans
The key here is to use your research to make informed decisions regarding succession at all levels. Start by identifying key positions that will need to be filled in the coming years and existing talent that may be able to move into these roles. Conduct additional people assessments to determine potential staffing issues and create training plans to fill skill gaps. Remember, while you are doing this for your organization, your savvy competitors are doing the same thing.

Throughout this process, communicate your plans and encourage your team to develop their professional skills. Hold talent impact sessions with staff, management and leaders so they know how they impact the organization. Develop your resource coaching abilities, hold talent review meetings, and ensure that you have engaged your employees in the process. Make sure your gaps are identified and revisit your plans, key action points and results on an ongoing basis.

3. Drive Change and Continuously Review
If you are responsible and accountable for talent management planning, make sure you are making decisions and leading the charge. You will need to identify any gaps and problems as they arise, get solutions in place and make sure they are implemented immediately. This is critical.

Ensure that present management have the skills to help assess what is needed. Break down us versus them thinking by creating a common language for your people. Solicit feedback from those impacted the most to review the process and ensure that morale remains intact. Employ continuous improvement thinking and remain flexible to ensure that talent management is an ongoing process.

The business world is a changing. That is nothing new. There is an age wave that is rushing through Canada and it’s creating a falling tide that will impact your business and create ripples throughout the community. It is best to prepare now for the changing tides of time and ensure that talent management forms a key part of your business strategy.

Updated Note: Recently I was working with a client who has a 33 percent retirement in 2 years. Small business of 50 people. That is 15 people all professionals with special training. That hurts! What are you doing to protect your business for the retirement bubble? Send me a note with your thoughts and I will reply with some thoughts in a mini 2 or 3 minute video. info@braveworld.ca Put Question Everything - Video in the subject line.