Right on Tommy, eh hum– Thomas Edison. The lack of execution in so many companies today is disheartening. That is why I like this quote; it is a wake-up call for many companies.
We got to this point for a variety of reasons. I’ll pick out two for the sake of brevity. First, about twenty some years ago, organizations realized there was a lack of visioning and strategic thinking capabilities within their ranks. Many executives down to directors had a challenging time thinking strategically. So, a strong movement came about to build up this competency. As a result, it became highly emphasized; people who could think strategically got promoted faster, there was a bevy of books and training courses on the subject, and it became a super cool thing to be able to vision and think strategically. It became a premium competency.
Another driver to where we are today is that people realized it was seemingly less work to vison and think strategically. “I will think of the big idea and the peasants can make it happen.” Plus, you were considered cooler if you could. Add that to the fact that social tendencies in today’s world are confused about what doing something tangible really is. Too many people think posting about something or putting a county’s flag as your profile pic is doing something. Yes of course, it is a positive thing and a wonderful way to show solidarity with a cause but is it really moving the dial? You see, t I have two friends who went to Ukraine- one to fight and one to offer medical assistance—who do you think I admire more, the person that posted an encouraging tweet or them?
Today, organizations are full of strategy sessions, retreats, vision boards, hothouse conferences for most everybody all the time. (I myself lead and have led many of these powerful sessions. But they all end with the shift of focus to execution.) Let me be clear, these are all great tools when applied well and at the right time but if one never gets out of the visioning process to execution, the company cannot perform to full potential.
Believe it or not, over the past few years I have heard front-line supervisors state they should be spending more time visioning and thinking strategically—well who the heck is making sure things are getting done? Many companies spend all their money on the offsite retreat putting together a plan, having the graphics department put the plan int a one page “placemat” and have the marketing department come up with a battle -cry. And then it often stops there. It cannot stop there—there must be execution.
Without Wozniak, would Jobs have been as successful? Organizations need both visionaries and implementers to be successful. And some people are good at the vision piece while some are incredibly good at execution. Some unique people may be good at both (Picture Edison grinding in the lab nonstop after drawing up the schematics.) Most of us lean one way for our true strength but have both to our avail if needed. One will just come more naturally. But in the end work must get done and results are what matter. A good plan today is better than a perfect plan tomorrow that never happens.
Who is generally an executive’s favorite worker? It is the go-to person who “gets stuff done” – GSD. It is equally valuable and necessary to have both the visionary and the person who can manifest the vision. For things to become tangible, there must be the first creation (Vision) and the second (Physical) creation. Both are necessary. So, as the pendulum has probably swung too far to the Vision side these days, it would be good to start building up the execution capacity in organizations. Effective ways to do this include rewarding those who produce results rather than rewarding them for working hard, stress ability in Project Management Skills-everyone needs these skills throughout the organization and get good at a chosen execution methodology. You might want to check out a great book on execution from my childhood friend Chris McChesney The 4 Disciplines of Execution.