2019 is here! What is your strategy for having the best business year yet?
One of the most important components for any business is to have a strategy, a plan, a roadmap that guides your actions and decision making processes. However, beyond that,
how can you truly bring your strategy to fruition? As discussed with JoDawn Whitlock- Karnowski, Global Marketing Director of UPS Capital, in the Business Growth Café, having a
formal, well vetted tool to communicate your goals can be a huge step in bringing your strategy to life.
While on the show, JoDawn discussed how the use of a strategy tree can help you organize your strategic roadmap. First, start at the top, identify your overall objective. From there, break it into substrategies, or “branches” of the tree, so to speak. Filter down the data into its many layers, and identify how each substrategy helps support the overall strategy.
It is important to not just establish your what, but also your how. As such, underneath your substrategies come your tactics. What will you do, and how will you build that tactic out? What is involved in that tactic? Who does the tactic involve? What needs to be done? In order to capitalize on your strategy, you need to build it all the way from top to bottom.
Why is this all so important? Well, often times we get distracted from our primary objectives. By narrowing our vision down to a few main “pillars,” we increase the likelihood of staying aligned with our strategic goals. Every business leader gets distracted or taken off course every once in a while, but having a clear vision at the end of the day can help you measure your effectiveness in the long term.
One tip in using this method is to establish check-ins with your team about how the tactics are being executed, as it is these tactics that ultimately drive the strategy as a whole. Check in weekly, and also put a comprehensive midyear review into place to truly identify any missing puzzle pieces in your strategic execution. Strategic development is also a key reason for checking in midyear: if your organization adjusts its primary goals, it is all the more important to connect with your team and reestablish the plan moving forward.
Strategy trees are effective in their ability to communicate throughout the entire organization and provide guidance and of what it is you want to accomplish, with a clear, focused approach. It provides a simple analogy that can allow you as a business leader to visually lay out each step of your strategy, and ultimately, ensure that everything is working together so that you can achieve the successful outcomes you desire.
For more insight on this topic and much more, listen to my recent interview with JoDawn Whitlock-Karnowski, on my radio show, Business Growth Cafe, here:
To subscribe to Business Growth Cafe for weekly insight on several business topics, visit businessgrowthcafe.com or your favorite podcasting platform.
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