A New Year... a New Business Plan (Part 2 of 3)
This is a three-part post, while it stands on its own you can read Part 1 by clicking here.
To recap my New Year's Eve post... My good friend Ken, with my guidance, had assembled a detailed business plan for 1996 and had struck a deal with the bankruptcy trustee of the company he previously worked for to maintain and service the old company's clients with his new company. While I do not want to minimize the extensive work that Ken did in putting together a proper business plan and negotiating the transaction with the bankruptcy trustee, it was the easy part. Now, the real challenge began... the actual execution of his new plan.
Research tells us that 85% to 90% of businesses fail to execute their yearly plan. Once you have a plan the first step should be in driving acceptance and agreement of your new strategic plan with your wider executive and management team.
Marc's Execution Tip: Roll out your 2025 Strategic Business Plan to your company with fanfare. Get your executive team on board and communicate via a company-wide meeting.
It is critical to elevate engagement and participation company-wide. A communication plan has to be created. Hold a company-wide 2025 plan roll-out meeting with all of your employees to share the plan with them. Your focus should be to get them excited about the plan and how it will not only help the company but also positively impact them.
Provide an overview of the history of the company, the previous quarter's results, and the major initiatives for the upcoming quarter.
Introduce the group of people who were involved in putting together the strategic plan. You want them to know that this isn't just coming from the CEO and the CFO. You want to introduce the four, six, or eight people that you've included as part of this process.
During the meeting, describe the basic principles of your strategic plan, as well as any new terms or definitions of terms. It has to be done in their language—don’t use words like EBITDA without explaining what that is.
Show your team how strategy has played a part in the growth of the company. They have to have a firm understanding that your company has put together strategies that, when executed, will result in success. The more the staff and the employees truly understand what the plan is, the more buy-in you'll receive from them in the end.
Provide key elements of what has led to past growth, the challenges you've incurred in the past, and how that has informed or helped guide you towards providing future direction.
Clearly describe the strengths and weaknesses of the company with specific examples, even if it involves mentioning the competition or calling out things that the executive team felt were weak within the company. Many organizations have had plans that lacked strategy or have poorly executed past plans, and this may have tainted your employees. If you're carrying out your plan in a different fashion, you should communicate clearly that you've taken a new approach or have reworked the plan from the ground up. If you're not specific on how this year is different, you might have a tsunami of resistance against it before you’ve even begun. So, get ahead of the resistance by naming the difference—this will help connect the employees to the plan. Describe in detail how this strategic plan differs from the ones in the past.
Outline the major strategic projects that the company has chosen for this quarter and the barriers that might prevent your organization from achieving these strategic objectives. Outline the metrics that you'll be tracking to ensure that you're achieving the execution of your strategic project.
Finally, remember that all employees have a different level of understanding. They come from different walks of life and are filling different roles within the company. Your plan needs to be described simplistically as does every aspect of it, so that everybody clearly understands what you're talking about. I've seen strategic plans that get way too technical for rolling out to a company meeting—you're not talking development, accounting, or legal jargon. You need to put things in layman’s terms so that everybody understands it.
Now... back to my friend Ken and his New company, Instrumentation Engineering. Ken started with a relatively clean slate. He was able to selectively build a new team from the old company's staff and add new talent as required. He brought on two partners who rounded out his expertise and would enhance the company's ability to execute his plan. He had a plan, but the execution quickly became his daily and main focus, and he shared it with every employee, showing them how this company would be different than the old one.
Years later, I visited Ken in his office. He pulled out the original plan that we had created on New Year's Day1996 out of his desk drawer. He said, "For the first year, I followed this plan nearly every day." Ken was and is masterful at execution.
Execution is what it takes to be successful. While having a plan is critical to your success, it is the Execution that results in millions!
More on Ken in part 3 of my New Year's post tomorrow!
If you don't have a plan for 2025, it's not too late—
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I'm dedicated to helping you have a Happy New Year! — Cheers, Marc
Marc L Daniels
The Billion Dollar Coach
