“Managing strategy is managing change.”
The people challenges during a strategy-implementation process can be overwhelming. I don’t have the ambition to solve them here but maybe a few tips can spark some ideas.
- Fix personal and stretched objectives linked to the strategy. Work the ‘what’ and the ‘how’ (include the learning objectives!). Challenging goals are more mobilising than goals within easy reach. Make sure that people understand the specific link to the strategy!
- Make sure you have an effective performance management process based on 3 major steps: the set-up of individual objectives, the mid-year review, and the evaluation at the end of the year. Make sure your management has the required skills to manage this process properly.
- Acknowledge success − individual performance must be monitored and managed. Praise those who out-perform their objectives, and make a clear distinction between high-performers and low-performers! Make sure your reward system truly differentiates between good and poor performance! Ensure transparency!
- Define the new behaviour required for executing the strategy.
- Define not only “what” needs to be done but also “how” it needs to be done.
- Make the new behaviour real by illustrating what kind of behaviour is “out” and what is new.
- Behaviour counts − and it starts with the management! Disengaged leaders can never inspire their people − be aware of the impact of the management’s level of commitment.
