Strategy execution best practices:
An article by Mario Chiock titled “What is Technical Debt” published on the 7th of November, 2016 carried this picture, which later my colleague, Shweta, shared with me. She went on to mention how relevant this picture was to our everyday lives and how we get tied in so much into the way things are, that we become oblivious to the better ways of doing them!
How true & how wonderfully depicted!
I realized how comfortable we get with the status quo that we “choose” not to look for the better ways. We “choose” to remain busy putting in countless hours of work that we just don’t have the time to “invest” in ourselves to become better. And the more we wish to achieve, the harder we work. But seldom take the time to look at how we can do more with less.
So I asked myself this. When was the last time I paused to check how I could become more “productive”? Well, I really couldn’t quite recall if I ever had that conversation in my head! Do I think it’s important? Oh hell yes. But do I do something about it actually? Well, maybe not right now. I have tons of things to finish……
Isn’t this what strategy execution is all about? We have great ideas & plans for our organizations, our own work and life. But getting the plans implemented on the ground requires us to put in the effort and time to think about the best way for getting it done. Even if it means, adopting a radically different approach. Harder does not necessarily result in better!
And then there are distractions, pulling us back into “our” comfort zones! The hoards of “urgent” things that we need to get done when we walk into the office, the tons of chores we need to complete on the weekends, and so on & so forth. Remaining steadfastly focused on the “important things” and having them as high priority, although they require perceptibly more time, given the “urgent stuff” we need to finish is imperative. The cost benefit is quite simple really. The time on the important things now will ensure that the urgent things get taken care of in lesser time in the future – the path to the better. Much like taking the time to switch to a wheel in the image above!
So, thank you Shweta for sharing this & for reinforcing the need for the third of my six commandments that reads “Challenge the status QUO. Question everything, but assumptions & not ideas”!
