I overheard that quote during a recent family gathering as a spirited game of tag had broken out. I had observed one of the children losing interest and had coached one of the older players to balance the ratio of winning and losing a bit to keep his siblings in the game. I suggested it […]
Let’s roll back the timeline a bit. Before COVID, the implementation of strategy hovered at less than a 30% success rate (per McKinsey). With my own recent research of more than 40 senior leaders since the COVID disruption, I’ve confirmed that COVID has driven high-performance firms towards even less efficiency in implementation (see my summary […]
If you are a senior leader, how do you create standout results? You become the leader of choice to find, form, and execute on true value. And how do you do it? By investing in your best leaders’ transformation capabilities. For this cycle, I’m encouraging senior leaders to think differently about how to structure their […]
Right now, our creative talent is very open to new opportunities. And one of the main reasons people (really) move? It’s because they perceive there’s a better chance of seeing their creative work realized in the hands of real customers in a new firm. With this in mind, there is one question that is the […]
A consistent observation of firms and organizations is a tendency to invest heavily in organizational-level capabilities and resources. Programs around functional leadership development, operational efficiency and process consistency have senior leader sponsors, standing budgets and metrics written into compensation plans. There is always one nagging question: are those investments connected to performance? Like an athlete […]
I’ve been talking with a number of product and services leaders in North America about the state of their recovery from the COVID period and I’m hearing several persistent themes. One that stands out? The sheer workload and deep fatigue they are experiencing. It really feels for all the world that you are doing the […]
Has this ever happened to you? As I was cleaning out my office the other day, I came across a report from a strategy offsite during my days as a Fortune 500 exec. If your firm is anything like the one I was part of, this may sound familiar…. We paid big money to have […]
It’s one of those moments we all remember from childhood: planting the beans in our third-grade science class. Yes, it’s about science, but it’s also about another deeper lesson: it takes time for the underground work to pay off in visible outcomes. Large ships turn slowly, and even when you do the right thing, are […]
I live in the portion of the country where winter carnivals are a thing, and one of the always interesting things to catch is the creation of the ice sculptures. A sculptor, skilled with power tools, chisels and hand saws goes to work and amazing forms emerge. As a “most senior executive,” can you do […]
When I do workshops for firms on how to accelerate strategic implementation, rarely does a session go by where the shortage of key talent does not come up. This has always been an issue when a firm has a strategic challenge to rise to a new level. But I am finding that as we work […]
