Researchers also found that senior leaders tend to think they communicate more effectively and act more consistently than their employees think they do. For example, 81% of surveyed managers told Hay researchers that their actions are consistent with their verbal communications, but only 53% of workers thought so.

Only about 20% of workers say their managers coach them regularly to help them improve their performance, and only about 40% say their manager plays an active role in their career development.

There are many factors which contribute to these gaps. Out of these factors, the most important one we found is the ability and the skill set of leaders to get things done (27 % leaders receive no training on essential management skills)

In this article, we have focused on functional skills essential for strategy execution. The behavioural and technical skills required, we believe have direct correlation to the functional skills required to complete the job on hand.

Here are the 20 skills that are essential for leaders to be better strategy executors;

Customer focus (Keeping the customer in mind and in the center of every decision you make and everything you do at work). Ability to identify the persona of both, internal and external customers. Ability to objectively understand customer needs. Ability to make decisions keeping the customer in mind.

Alignment (Aligning individual goals and obtaining buy-ins across the team on the goals and strategies). Ability to involve team members while setting goals. Ability to cascade and align objectives across the team. Ability to convert goals into specific objectives and doable tasks.

Collaboration (Collaborating with people within the team, different departments, levels of organization, and different offices, different areas of expertise and culture to achieve a common goal). Ability to ensure smooth flow of communication across departments. Ability to collaborate along the supply chain to ensure business continuity, Ability to optimise team collaboration to enhance service levels to customers.

Negotiation (Developing strong interpersonal relationships by creating a win-win for team members, vendors and customers). Ability to evaluate alternatives and find the best route to optimally execute. Ability to negotiate with suppliers to find optimal cost & mitigate supply risks. Ability to negotiate with customers to deliver customer needs without burdening the firm with unrealistic expectations.

Continuous Improvement (Exceed expectation and add value to everything that you do). Ability to build a culture of innovation. Ability to encourage out of box thinking, acknowledging and rewarding innovations. Ability to continuously review and work towards stretch goals and targets.

Risk Management (Commitment to mitigate operational risks). Ability to foresee and manage operational risks. Ability to develop appropriate contingency plans to enable quick recovery and avoid inconvenience to customers.

Motivation (Lead by example and motivating your team to execute). Ability to create an environment where all team member are clear about their roles and their contribution towards a common goal. Ability to promote knowledge sharing. Ability to encourage sharing of ideas and creativity.

Mentoring (Effectively transfer knowledge, be compassionate and achieve team’s potential). Ability to nurture and develop potential leaders. Ability to inspire people through knowledge transfer. Ability to ensure continuous learning to plan succession.

Delegation (Assign work, trust and allow space to perform). Ability to accurately assign responsibility to increase efficiency and drive results. Ability to optimally allocate resources based on individual strengths.

Discipline (Being clear, strong-minded and living the process). Ability to live the values and achieve unison. Ability to execute complex tasks in a systematic manner. Ability to be disciplined and strong minded.

Recruitment (Identifying and deploying the right fit). Ability to identify activities, specific tasks, responsibilities and behavioural requirements for all positions. Ability to analyse, assess and hire the right fit.

Planning and Organizing (Ability to prioritise and work on both urgent and important tasks). Ability to prioritise, conceive and develop plans. Ability to systematically execute plans. Ability to continuously focus on short term and long term outcomes.

Communication (Careful listening, prompt & clear top down communication). Ability to actively listen and get complete clarity from leadership. Ability to communicate complex ideas through simpler understandable language and methods. Ability to ensure the message reaches the last person in the link.

Change management (Open to change, being agile and implement change). Ability to judge the scope, effort and impact of the proposed change across your team. Ability to timely and effectively communicate changes by aligning and getting buy-ins from team members.

Performance Enablement (Enabling and ensuring individual and team success). Ability to clearly define metrics which can inspire and accurately measure performance. Ability to conduct continuous evaluation and enable performance. Ability to provide complete clarity and growth opportunities to motivate and attain full potential.

Agility (Willingness to change). Ability to stick to deadlines without compromising service levels. Ability to clearly understand and exceed expectations. Ability to consistently meet changing customer requirements.

Attention to detail (Quality of work). Ability to collate different points of view and take appropriately steps for thoroughness & accuracy. Ability to plan in relative order based on the importance of tasks. Ability to focus on details while not losing track of the big picture.

Handling Tasks (Prioritising and multitasking). Ability to form and understand a logical sequence of the tasks. Ability to understand the complexity and intricacy of the processes and the criticality of task at hand. Ability to allocate and optimally use resources to handle important tasks.

Managing Initiatives (Seeing new initiatives yield desired results). Ability to accurately forecast the resource requirement and allocate accordingly. Ability to effectively judge and going after initiatives which can add value to the organization. Ability to align new initiative to the company’s value proposition.

Bottlenecks (Ensuring smooth flow to deliver on time). Ability to completely understand the processes and systems. Ability to allocate resources to optimally approach bottlenecks. Ability to avoid resource wastage due to repeat activities.

Metis has developed an on-line assessment tool to assess leaders on these 20 essential skills. The assessment tool is based on situational judgement inventories and direct questioning techniques. This tool can be used to assess incumbent leaders and while recruiting for leadership roles. Do write in to us on shweta@metisindia.com or enquiry@metisindia.com for more details.

Context matters. Even though capability required to perform a particular task may seem similar in a given Industry, It can be starkly different. It could vary depending on the organisations location, culture, values, vendors, customers, market and so on…

Our effort is to assist you in identifying contextual capabilities essential for strategy execution. The behavioural and technical capabilities required, we believe, have direct correlation to the functional capability required to complete the job on hand.

We have presented it as a checklist to make sure you address all aspects of contextual capability building.

Please download the document (,pdf) here: 
Leadership responsibility #2 - Contextual capability building (37679 downloads )

“Accountability” is known to most people. One should also know that there is more to it than just writing job descriptions and if incomplete can reduce the chances of implementing your organisation goals by 75%. Accountability should be used as a tool to inspire people to unlock their potential.

Accountabilities are dynamic and constantly require scrutiny and realignment. It should be treated as a relationship building exercise between its people.

The word “Objective” has been extensively used in this document, to imply that all responsibilities and accountability should come with utmost clarity and should contain numbers and timelines.

Accountability should fall to one (and only one) “person” per task, even if the task requires input and contributions from others. Making sure that the “person” understands his accountability, in all and specific situations, that are critical across the organisation.

We have put down important aspects to be well thought-out to ensure accountability for a leader and his team. We have presented it as a checklist to make sure you address all aspects while arriving at accountability.

Download the document (.pdf) here:
Leadership responsibility #1 – Role clarity & accountability (5740 downloads )

My colleague would religiously refer to this quote every time we set out to pursue a challenging initiative. Many a times even when we have embarked on initiatives somewhat similar to what we have pursued before.

This quote is apt, especially, in today’s business scenario where customer requirements are ever changing, requiring organisations to be agile and dynamic. Organisations and its people need to continuously do things that they have never done before.

To do things you have never done before we need to navigate through what we have done before. We have over the years, accumulated many methods and processes that have worked for us. We tend to apply this while executing, in almost every goal that we pursue.

Does this mean that the earlier experiences are not relevant?  In today’s business scenario, we doubt it very much as many of methods and mental models that you built your career on may be irrelevant, incomplete or ineffective. They can be made relevant only when contextually applied to the job on hand. So you unlearn what you already know and learn new ways to get the job done.

“Unlearning” is popularly defined as “to make an effort to forget your usual way of doing something so that you can learn a new and sometimes better way”

Let’s take the game of golf; if you have not pursued sports earlier you would be more likely to pick up the game faster than the person who has been playing tennis, simply because you do not have any preconceived method or process of hitting a ball. The tennis player has to unlearn a fair bit to learn golf!   When we unlearn, we step outside the mental model in order to choose a different one.

In organisations, unlearning is the ability to work on alternative mental model than what we already know. By doing this, we constantly develop new methods and skills to execute agile objectives in this ever changing business landscape.

Imagine a typical organisation where leaders are operating with mental models that may have worked for them earlier, but these may have grown ineffective. We believe this to be one of the contributory factors to execution gaps.

Learning in organisations may not be the problem: it’s unlearning. Mental models are useful when utilised diligently. So, what does it take to unlearn and build newer mental models?

Old mental methods and habits
· Identify all reactions and automatic actions coming from past methods and become aware of it.
· Acknowledge that some methods are outdated and not relevant.
· Let go even if you need to start a fresh.

Creating new methods and ways
· Be open and think beyond the logic you know
· Create new methods to better execute your goals

Making new mental methods a habit
· Catch yourself falling back on the old mental habits
· Follow a routine that encourages new methods
· Reward yourself for every new method

To make new mental methods a habit here is a process that can be followed every time you embark on a new initiative / objective.

“Understanding” the objective, the uniqueness and the big picture.
> Understanding objectively the different “Customer Needs” who are directly impacted by the objective
> Listing out a set of activities to achieve the objective while satisfying customer needs
> Identify and mitigate risks along the defined set of activities
> Identify contextual (on ground) capability requirements along the defined set of activities
> Identify and get buy-ins from collaborators who are required to complete the defined set of activities
> Review the objective and activities every week to improve and make changes

Metis interventions are designed using our Individualised Value Proposition (IVP) method to bring in relevance and facilitate participants to; appreciate, identify, develop and apply skills to achieve individual goals and objectives. The participants need to improvise and think out of the box to get things done. Do write in to us on shweta@metisindia.com  or enquiry@metisindia.com  if you require more details on the methodology.

• Strategic intent gives a common purpose, lays emphasis on opportunities to pursue and      inspires    every stakeholder in the organization.
• Strategic intent is usually derived from the company’s vision (or) many a times strategic  intents form the basis for creating a vision for the organisation.
• Strategic Intent directs the organization’s focus, thoughts and actions to the present.
• Strategic intent defines the purpose of your organisations’ existence in the ecosystem. It  defines your actions around growth, operations, innovation and customer.

Strategy execution practices – Organisation goals formalises the key success factors required to execute the intent

• Organisation goals translate the strategic intent into actionable, relevant, measurable goals.
• Organisations goals should be holistic and necessarily span across organisation growth,  operations efficiency, innovation and customer delight.
• Involve all key stakeholders while arriving at organisation goals. Stakeholders buy-in is  critical for business success.

Strategy execution practices – Department goals enable organisation goals

• Key stakeholders across functions and operations must converge and create goals that make  everyone accountable for the execution of the organisation goals.
• Every department / function should involve key stakeholders while arriving at goals and  KRA’s for successful execution.
• Department goals have to be transparent, objective and communicated effectively to all  stakeholders in the ecosystem.
• Each department should necessarily have at least one KRA for every organisation goals. This  way all departments contribute to the overall achievement of the goals.

If organizational performance is but merely its ability to translate market potential into financial success, then it is imperative that “people capability” is a crucial success factor for any organization.

While numerous studies, research, thought & action have gone into developing fairly advanced models & frameworks for competence management, on the ground facts reveal that the largest impediment to organizational success is strategy implementation (for which competence is a vital contributor). So, if competence was indeed being managed well, why doesn’t it reflect in organizational performance?

Global studies reveal that over 50% of managers worldwide attribute lack of capability of their teams to sub optimal performance. Furthermore, our own study reveals that the average capability, as seen by the leadership, vis-a-vis the requirement to implement organizational strategies stands at 67% with the best figure pegged at 72%!

Now, isn’t this shocking! Well, it was for us. So we dug deeper. We wanted to find out what caused this lack of capability & here’s what we found!

While there was no dearth of knowledge (education) or skills (experience) in an organization, the biggest impediment came from the ability to apply the available knowledge & skills in the context that was required by the strategy / for the job at hand.

So, while education & experience could be at best indicators of potential, capability is actually the ability of an individual to adapt & apply the understanding in the present organizational context. It is the consistency & adaptability of one to continuously transform understanding into application and vice versa.

So, apart from the individual’s attitude (which is beyond the control of the organization other than plausibly providing the appropriate work environment), is there a lever that can be perused to coax better application of knowledge?

The answer is yes! If we cull capability requirements from smaller activity chunks, the context in which a particular skill or understanding is to be applied can be called out, thus reducing bias which otherwise hampers contextual application.

Role based capability building: If we draw out a process chart to achieve the goal at hand, we can then identify specific capability requirements for each of the activities that get called out.  Addressing specific capability gaps would then help enhance execution and ultimately performance.

For example, let’s look at a typical vendor development process:

Let’s say negotiations skills is an imperative requirement for the process above. Although the underlying skills of negotiation would remain for all organizations with similar processes as above, the context of vendor relationship (price v/s value) that is unique to each organization, would essentially determine the context in which the negotiation skills are to be applied.

In other words, negotiating with vendors for quality and timeliness requires different adaptability of negotiating skills than negotiating with vendors for price, even though the underlying skills requirements are the same. To perform the activity at hand, hiring the right person with the right skills or training existing people with specific inputs is sure to get better results.

For us to be able to coax our organization to better execute our strategies, isn’t it imperative for us to translate our plans into objective goals for each strategy implementing entity at our firm? Isn’t is important for us to ensure that all the entities in our organization are aligned to our plans? Aren’t these threshold requirements?

Our study of over two dozen organizational leaders across industries & organizational sizes revealed quite another thing!

The clarity in what an organization wished to achieve was found to be a mere 70%

Since optimal execution of business strategy begins with a clear & uniform understanding of what needs to be achieved as an organization, we dug deeper to figure out the causes of this low score, and here’s what we found!

1) Although leaders were quite clear about what to pursue as an organization & what direction to take, this wasn’t necessarily communicated effectively to all layers within the organization. In certain cases, there was an absence of objective goals. In certain others, goals were centered around sales & revenues which essentially meant that the necessary thrust for customer focus, operational efficiency, quality, evolution and other success factors required for sustenance & performance were missing!

2) Yet another crucial factor that determined clarity was the number of goals that an organization pursued. While no goals or for that matter sales only goals obviously meant ineffective management having too many goals was also a problem. Having too many goals blurred priorities thereby reducing clarity on what actually mattered the most to the organization. A global study based on the law of diminishing returns suggests the following

3) The third crucial factor owing to a low clarity in the what, was an inherent disconnect between strategies & the customer! Oxymoronic? Well, its true! Although customers are an indispensible partner for success, not enough attention was being paid to understanding their precise needs. (In case you missed the article, please click here).

4) The fourth crucial factor were the goals themselves! On the one hand, certain organizations provided more impetus to an extrapolation of past achievements while setting goals, thereby not factoring organizational & market potential. On the other hand, organizations laid a lot of thrust on aspirations while setting goals, in which case the market realities were not factored. In effect the desirable balance between market realities, past performance & aspirations remained unachieved.

5) Last, but not the least was a missing alignment from the organizational stakeholders who were actually responsible for implementing the strategies on the ground. We found that the average alignment achieved by organizations was 72%!

The gap stemmed from factors like,

 a) No buy in

b) Only one or few entities could see how they impacted the organizational goals. The remaining organizational entities really did not see the connect between their contributions and the organizational goals.

 c) The measures for any given goal seemed to remain the same across various levels, thus blurring accountabilities & alignment. The following pyramid showcases the typical distribution of focus areas for success.

This really set me thinking how the poll predictions went so horribly wrong!

I don’t doubt for one moment the mathematical models or the competencies of the data analysts. In fact, I do believe that poll analysts would have some amazing models built from years of election research and experience that would most likely predict, to a great deal of accuracy, what the election would turn out to be.

As a person who is obsessed with data, this story reminds me of a fundamental principle of data analysis or for that matter life; that of removing biases! I wonder what the predictions would have looked like if the sampling for the poll surveys had been done with lesser biases. In fact, one of the local English channels covering the US elections reported a few people arguably from the Clinton campaign coming out of the White House exclaiming “where are these people who are voting coming from?”

Isn’t it as simple as the equation,

Even great models fitted to samples with bias = Biased predictions = Biased decisions

Now, to think about it, I realized biases are everywhere and define the way we manage our personal and professional lives. As simple as it is and I’m sure this is no eye opener for anyone, but the question is, how open are we to question our own assumptions and how often do we actually see ourselves doing it?

One of my three commandments I follow in my professional life reads: “Challenge the Status Quo. Question everything, but assumptions & not ideas.” For me, the need for this commandment just gets reinforced and I pledge to myself to follow this more vigorously.

Organizational leaders, more often than not, are able to clearly see the impact their organizations can create in the marketplace. They see the huge opportunities that exist and build strategies to capitalize on them. However, the organization’s performance often tells another story!

How many of us haven’t heard what Norman Vincent Peale said famously “Shoot for the moon. Even if you miss, you’ll land among the stars.”? I thought this would make for an interesting parallel in an organizational context.

Let’s say that a few organizations indeed have the capability to land on the moon. Various global studies reveal that while many among them would even barely manage a “lift off”, a few other better performing ones at best, would achieve transatlantic passages. Only the crème de la crème manage to reach the moon. Why the disparity in performance when all the organizations had similar capabilities to start with?

Recently, I came across a very interesting HBR article which captured beautifully and succinctly, this disparity between performance and potential at organizations. Authors Michael C. Mankins and Richard Steele call it the VENETIAN BLINDS EFFECT IN BUSINESS. I have attempted to recreate the graphic they used to describe an effect that is found to occur at organizations, big and small.

So this is what happens. In year 1, the management approves a strategic plan that is quite modest for the first year (getting ready to grow big phase) and thereafter, aims to grow to a level that is more commiserative of its potential! At the end of year 1, they realize that the earlier plans of achieving a high growth in year 2 might not be “realistic” and that they’re not “ready” yet to achieve the planned rate of performance improvement. Thus, at the start of year 2, a new plan is prepared which projects rather uninspiring results for the subsequent year while once again promising a fast rate of performance improvement thereafter! This recurs in an organization’s lifetime and thus the performance of an organization is never really close to what its potential is! In fact, if things are going reasonably well, the starting point for each year’s new “blind” may be ONLY a BIT higher than the previous year’s starting point, but rarely does performance match the true potential of an organization.

While some organizations go into the “MAKE BELIEVE” phase of saying that they’re performing well, they’re, most often than not, comparing their performance to “the modest targets” shown in the graphic and not really the potential they posses.

And then, there are a set of newer breeds of organizations that tend to focus primarily on one parameter of performance (mostly growth), invariably at the COST of other parameters that sustain a business!

If organizations are value creation engines, in that sense, organizational performance MUST be a reflection of the business, technological and social logic they combine to create the VALUE. Therefore, I opine that organizations that tend to focus any one parameter of performance at the cost of others are not really “performing”!

Amidst all this, we see that a few organizations (the crème de la crème) manage to achieve results that are a true reflection of their potential.

SO, WHAT SETS THE HIGH PERFORMING ORGANIZATIONS APART?

Well, we believe that there are primarily three things that contribute to the disparity between performance and potential and when these are constantly focused on and improved upon sets an organization well on its path to greatness!

1. Clarity in the WHAT
2. Clarity in the HOW
3. Science of effective business execution

CLARITY IN THE WHAT

While studies reveal that the leadership at organizations are quite clear on what “largely” needs to be achieved, sometimes a clear cut definition is found lacking in terms of saying we need to GET to Point A from Point B within a specific timeframe.

Let’s go back to the example of those organizations we spoke about earlier, that possess capabilities to LAND on the MOON. While the leadership at most of these organizations would be quite clear about the overarching mission of landing on the moon, only the highly performing companies would “translate” that mission to a goal that every entity within the organization could work towards.

Consider this! When Eisenhower (erstwhile President of the United States) announced the mission of achieving space supremacy by the US during his regime, there was indeed a lot of activity, including the creation of NASA.  However, not until the next couple of years, when President Kennedy stated that the goal was to put a man on the moon by the end of the decade, did we hear about a man named Neil Armstrong who actually set foot on the moon!

CLARITY IN THE HOW

This is yet another characteristic of great companies. Not only do they clearly mention what are the results they have set out to achieve, there is clarity among every entity in the organization on HOW their everyday activities have to change to support the organization goals. There is enough impetus laid on getting a buy in from the strategy implementers during the formulation of strategies and, a clear sense of HOW every entity needs to contribute is well established.

Why is this important you ask? Well, Stephen Covey put it simply when he said if you want to achieve goals you’ve never achieved before, you need to start doing things that you’ve never done before!

Now let’s go back to our previous example of those set of organizations that are shooting for the moon. Let’s say that a certain Mr. X was hired by the company because of his skills in improving the fuel efficiency of an engine. Furthermore, let’s say that Mr. X has been working on improving the fuel efficiency of cars since the time he joined the organization, because that was the focus of the organization up until now.

If this Mr. X continues to work along the same things that he’s been working on in the past, and perhaps even harder than ever before, do you think he would still be able to make any meaningful contribution to the organizational goal? Remember, the organization now wants to land on the moon. Wouldn’t you agree that the organization would rather benefit if his “focus changed” towards making rocket engines more efficient?

I agree that the example is a bit exaggerated and may even sound absurd, but unfortunately this is a sad reality at many organizations!

SCIENCE OF EFFECTIVE BUSINESS EXECUTION

This is perhaps the largest gap that prevents organizations from achieving “greatness”. In fact, studies reveal that close to 75% of organizations globally, struggle to implement their strategies!

Although we might know what to achieve as an organization and the path we need to take, we are most often than not pulled into activities that we perceive as “URGENT” on an everyday basis. Chris McChesney, from the Franklin Covey Institute, calls this the whirlwind effect. (To know more about this, please click here). The trick is therefore to stay focused on the important things we need to do, amidst this whirlwind of activities that we perceive as URGENT on a daily basis!

This is yet another undertaking that great organizations do really really well. They are able to break down the goal into specific activities that different entities need to perform and get them to see the importance! Allocate the best possible resources based on an optimal competency fit, identify and track indicators that can be influenced on a daily / weekly basis, identify risks and prepare for a suitable response and finally, influence performance to achieve the goal as opposed to measuring performance as a post mortem of what has already happened.

Let’s go back to the organizations who want to land on the moon. Consider this scenario.

One organization goes about doing what it was doing in the past, and perhaps in its view, more efficiently than before. It measures its performance vis-a-vis its target of landing on the moon only at the end of the year.

V/S

Another organization that,

• Breaks down the task of landing on the moon to activities like building an efficient rocket, hire the best astronaut, acquire funding among others.
• Identified how much of time they have (known as TAKT in Lean parlance) to complete each activity
• Allocate the best resources (competence) they have for each activity
• Identify the metrics they could track on a daily / weekly basis (like time to build the rocket, competency level of the astronaut v/s what’s required for a successful mission)
• Work constantly & cohesively towards improving these metrics
• Influence performance through coaching, mentoring etc on a continuum.

Who in your view better stands to land on the moon?

I’m guessing you’d agree with me that organization 1 is more likely to fall short, really short. Perhaps not even being able to take off! At best, achieve a transatlantic flight.

Guess what their immediate reaction would be at the end of the “performance review”?  Most likely, “To reset the target for the next year saying that they’ll need some more time to get ready before actually being able to land on the moon”, a dynamic that is captured beautifully by the VENETIAN BLINDS EFFECT!

With organization 2, even if there are certain “external” factors that may prevent it from landing on the moon, there is certainly a high likelihood that they’ll at least land on the stars! Right you are Mr. Peale!

Simple stuff, you say? Yes, I agree. But sadly, very often neglected!

Here’s an interesting question I’d like to ask you, “Would people in our organization still be busy even if they are given no goals to pursue?”

Most likely the answer is yes!

Why is this the case?

Well, Chris McChesney, from the 4 disciplines of execution, attributes this to the “whirlwind effect” which takes precedence at workplace. He defines the “whirlwind effect” as the everyday job that people think is the “real” work that they need to do.

However, most often than not, activities required to achieve a new goal require new efforts and initiatives. Although people tend to think that these new efforts are certainly important, they tend to pass them off as being not urgent for them to pursue. This is because they are caught in the “whirlwind” of doing their everyday jobs that they prioritize as being urgent.

And, needless to say when urgency and importance clash, urgency tends to win! Think about the last time you thought something was important and interesting for the achievement of your organizational goals, but you couldn’t spend time on it because you were drawn into the tussle of executing the “everyday activities”.

Here’s another thought provoking question we need to ask ourselves constantly: Is what we think as urgent on a day to day basis really important for us to achieve our goals?

Chris also quotes Ram Charan, the execution Guru from his book, Execution – The discipline of getting things done, where he states that “70% of poor execution is due to poor execution of leaders. It’s rarely for lack of smarts or vision!”

So then, what are the 7 things we can focus on to ensure that we substantially improve our chances of achieving our goals?

1. Do we, at first, know clearly what we need to achieve as an organization?
2. Does everyone in the organization know clearly “WHAT“ they need to do to, for the organization to achieve its goals?
3. Does everyone know “HOW” to achieve their goals?
4. Is there a clear idea about what organizational capabilities, processes and systems are required to achieve the goals and where are we currently as an organization?
5. Do we have leading and lagging indicators for the goals that we can use to monitor and control the execution?
6. Does everyone in the organization have a clear cut accountability towards the organizational goals?
7. Do you as the organizational leader spend time towards performance coaching? Have you enabled a culture of  performance coaching?

As with any other effort, successful execution requires a concerted and cohesive approach, otherwise we are leaving many things to chance! And, I’m sure you’d agree with me that leaving things to chance almost never guarantees any results!

P.S. Metis ERC(I) Pvt. Ltd. has developed frameworks and philosophies that enable a scientific and cohesive approach to business execution. Please get in touch with us to know more about them.