SME Strategy is a strategy consulting firm that specializes in helping organizations align their teams and operations around a shared vision, mission, values, goals, and action plans. Our strategic planning services offer guidance on how a strategic planning facilitator can provide support in constructing an effective strategic plan that ensures your strategy is communicated and implemented across your entire organization.
The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU), sponsored by the Brightline Initiative surveyed 500 high-ranking executives from billion-dollar companies. The results showed how widespread the problem of poor strategy implementation is.
90% of respondents said that they couldn't reach their strategic goals because they didn't have enough delivery capacity, and 53% said that made them vulnerable to competitors.
These findings underscore the importance of effective strategy implementation. Without it, your strategic goals are unlikely to be achieved, and you may be leaving yourself vulnerable to competitors.
For leadership teams looking to take action, successful strategy execution starts with recognizing that strategy is more than a document. In a cyclical process, strategy implementation requires a continual focus on alignment, communication, and two key areas: goal setting and action planning. Without tracking and monitoring progress, organizations risk failing to execute their strategic plans. To ensure successful implementation, leaders must ensure that goals are set and plans are in place to make them happen.
Strategic Goal Setting helps, but why and how?
It’s not uncommon for teams to feel great after a strategic planning session and then for the momentum to slow down a few weeks or months later. This is often due to a lack of SMART goals and an action plan that is specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound. Without SMART goals, teams may lose alignment and it can be difficult to determine progress until it’s too late to adjust your course.
When setting SMART goals, leadership teams are able to ensure that all team members are working towards the same desired outcome. Moreover, with consistent tracking, monitoring, and reporting, teams are encouraged to become proactive, strategic thinkers who evaluate their feedback loops to assess the progress being made toward their desired outcome. This is beneficial for all organizations, as it allows them to easily report their SMART goal progress to their board, shareholders, and other stakeholders. In summary, SMART goals create an environment where your teams are able to work together in a unified manner and easily report their progress to key stakeholders.
Download our free Goal Setting Guide & Worksheet:
Once you have progressed through the stages of strategic planning, from discussing your company's vision to establishing goals, the next step is to construct a thorough action plan for implementing your strategy.
Goal-setting is one thing, but action planning is something else entirely.
“A goal without an action plan is a daydream.”
Creating an action plan and aligning it with your organizational goals is an essential step in your strategic planning process. While many organizations are familiar with action planning and task management as a part of their daily operations, this plan should be tailored to your organization's unique goals and objectives.
Action planning is the process of deciding what needs to be done when it needs to be done, and who will be responsible for it. It's about breaking down a larger goal into smaller, achievable tasks that you can check off as you progress. Creating an action plan is a great way to ensure that your team is working towards the same goal and that your organization's strategy is connected to its operations.
Constructing an action plan necessitates focusing on your core strategic objectives and both short-term and long-term goals of your organization, in line with your strategic planning timelines. Your action plan should also include an accountability system that outlines who is responsible for what tasks, and how they will be measured. Finally, it's important to track progress and make sure that you're meeting your goals as you go.
Read more: Improve Strategy Implementation with our 7 Best Practices for Action Planning
Done Goal Setting & Action Planning, but still struggling? You're not Alone
For most leadership teams, the challenge of achieving strategic goals lies in the lack of capacity to effectively cascade the goals and actions from the executive team to middle managers and front-line workers. Without the proper guidance and support, it can be difficult to guarantee that each and every employee is bought in and aligned on your organization's strategy. To guarantee success, it is essential that your leadership teams provide clear instructions and guidance to their teams, and ensure that all employees are provided with the tools they need to achieve your strategic goals.
2 Ways Management Training Programs Help You Execute Your Goals and Action Plans
As a leader of a large organization, you may find that due to the lack of a strategic planning facilitator and the realities of day-to-day operational tasks, some individuals, teams, and even whole departments can be left behind without a clear goal and action plan that aligns to that of your organization's vision and mission.
From our experience working with hundreds of organizations to develop and implement their strategic plans, we know that this can be a major challenge. Therefore, it is essential that your strategic initiatives are executed by every member of your organization. One effective way to ensure this is by implementing management training programs to support the development of your leadership team, and reducing the probability and cost of not accomplishing your strategic plan.
Here's how they help:
1. Management training programs help leadership teams develop the skills needed to effectively lead their teams through the strategy implementation process. They learn how to delegate responsibility, set clear and achievable goals, and devise strategies that ensure team members are working together to reach those objectives. This will enable the team to stay on track and maintain a unified approach to reach your desired end goal.
2. Management Training Programs help foster a collaborative environment and help your middle managers understand the complexities of implementing a strategy. They learn about the various stakeholders involved, the resources needed to effectively execute the strategy, and any potential risks associated with the process. This enables them to make informed decisions on the best approach to take and how to avoid any potential pitfalls. With this knowledge, your leadership teams are better equipped to ensure successful strategy implementation.
Are you having a strategy meeting soon? Get our free 2-Day strategic planning agenda. This will provide the framework and structure to help you set and reach your organization's goals.
The Goal Setting and Action Planning Problems we're helping Solve
Are you a leader looking to transform your organization through goal-setting and action-planning management training? If so, our goal-setting & action-planning management training program is for you.
Our Management training program is a series of modules delivered by our team to help your team execute its strategic plan.
What you get in this Management Training Program:
In our management training program on Goal Setting & Action Planning
- We work with your leadership team to ensure you have clear and articulate benchmarks for success and a plan of action to work toward them.
- We assist your leadership team in developing at least three SMART goals that align with each of your strategic priority areas, to ensure you are aiming for shared outcomes and building accountable teams,
-We will help your organization maintain its ongoing alignment so you can implement your strategic plan and move toward your desired future state.
By completing this module alongside all our other management training programs, leaders and their teams will strengthen their overall capacity for strategy execution.
Are you ready to take your team's management skills to the next level and execute your strategic goals? Book a call with us today to learn more about our management training programs.
