spring 2009

The importance of strategy and engagement during the economic downturn

By Adie Shariff

The current economic downturn has led many organisations to re-strategise. However, strategy can only be realised if people are focused on making it happen. This logic can be ignored in good times. In uncertain times people often mistakenly over focus on operational minutiae, even if their organisational future is relatively secure. So how do you cultivate strategic discipline? Here are some tips:

• Stimulate thinking about 'doing' strategy
  Get people thinking about the reality of doing your visionary words. For example, ask people to imagine they have failed in strategy delivery. Then explore what needs to be done to safeguard performance. This exercise mentally engages people with strategy, identifies Critical Success Factors, and helps pragmatise plans.
• Be clear on 'Critical Success Factors' (CSFs)
  CSFs are criteria that need to be protected to realise a vision (for example, 'best in market client satisfaction'). CSFs enable people to relate their work to strategy. They also foster initiative – enabling people to assess threat to strategy and move to action. Stick to five or six CSFs and state them as aspirational objectives.
• Get people to 'briefback' local strategies
  Strategy needs accountability. Ask people to 'briefback' their local strategies and how they relate to the bigger plan. Briefbacks require people to develop a strategic point-of-view. So in itself, this can be a leadership development exercise.
• Think forwards
  Uncertainty causes panic. Get your team to define realistic future scenarios that could derail strategy. Ask: "If this were to occur, how would we respond to stay on track?" This type of exercise fosters adaptive thinking when the unexpected happens.
• Create time to focus on strategy
  A simple tip here is to separate meetings or agendas according to: Revenue ('bottom-line' or outcome measure items), Operations (administrative items) and Strategy (items relating to review of CSFs and future performance). These categories are separate conversations. As a result, meetings will become more focused, and you and your team will develop a sense of being strategic.

Get the basics right and you could be handling diamonds.

A 'strategy execution' case study in the education sector

"We can all be going in the same direction but never meet."

This was what one staff member said at the start of the journey to stay focused on strategy at a major FE college in the South West of England.

Working with the College in its bid to become a sustainable 'Grade 1’, Ashridge has started to put in place strategy execution as a practical and relevant intervention. Halfway through the programme there are already noticeable changes.

A long-term investment in better direction setting, improved delegation and safeguarding of local plans has already started to yield impressive results. A learning pathway that helps turn individual thinking into individual doing, on a scale that has organisational impact, has been designed. And through the use of action learning, simulations and practical tools, staff are already dealing more effectively with critical incidents.

By avoiding stop-start initiatives, staff at the college are doing day-to-day activities in a different way. ‘Briefback’ techniques and collaboration are breaking down silos. Staff report that the amount of ‘problem talk’ is reducing as new conversations focus on making things happen.

As one member of staff put it about the College’s partnership with Ashridge:

“I think the little thing – well it’s not a little thing, it’s a huge thing, but it seemed a little thing – has been to ‘open up’ and give a more comfortable feel to communication cross-college. I think what that’s done within the college – and I can see this has happened – is that we have begun to unwrap some of the ‘taboo’ areas which all institutions have. That’s not just down to Ashridge, but the process that we have instigated – it’s had a really fundamental effect.”

In April, Ashridge Education and Skills and CSD held an event which looked at entrepreneurialism within economic downturn. Click here to read the event report.

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also in this issue...

• Elusive equity: education and skills in South Africa
• Closing the Gender Skills Gap in the UK
• Training in a global, and local, downturn
• When will vocational education training step out from the shadow of academic learning?
• The wonders of eep

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"Diamonds are nothing more than chunks of coal that stuck to their jobs."

Malcolm Forbes