Should I Stay or Should I Go?

Feb 21, 2023 | Leadership Development

When you read the title for this article, you may have heard the 1981 song from The Clash in your head. It’s a great song. Like that song, this article is about deciding to stay or leave a relationship. However, in this case, I’m talking about leaving the relationship with your current role or employer. Obviously a decision like this isn’t one to be taken lightly, even if it’s one that needs to be made quickly. As several of my coaching clients have come to realize as they look at...

Culture Eats Strategy for…an Appetizer

Jan 24, 2023 | Strategic Planning

We’ve all heard Peter Drucker's saying, “Culture eats strategy for lunch [or breakfast].” I am, of course, not going to disagree with that statement. However, given the work world today, it’s not enough. Culture doesn’t just eat strategy for breakfast or lunch. Culture eats strategy as an appetizer. Then it eats strategy for breakfast, lunch, dinner, dessert, a snack, etc. A poor company culture will eat up and spit out your organization if its cultural framework, strategic priorities, and...

Don’t Create a Laundry List. Create a Strategic Plan

Dec 13, 2022 | Strategic Planning

It happens frequently. It happens with C-Suite executives as well as with mid-level managers. It happens when the excitement of DOING things to transform the organization takes hold. ‘It’ is when the strategic planning team focuses more on what they’re going to DO instead of what they want to ACHIEVE. It is when they stop thinking strategically. It causes teams to create laundry lists instead of strategic plans. …when the strategic planning team focuses more on what they’re going to DO instead...

Stop Boring Strategic Plan Updates

Nov 22, 2022 | Strategic Planning

An association executive director asked during a recent coaching conversation, “Am I doing something wrong, or why are the strategic plan review meetings I hold with my senior staff so boring? My Director of Operations said yesterday, ‘It feels as if all we’re doing is tracking stuff so we can mark it off this master plan.’ You know what? She’s right. That’s exactly what it feels like.” Well I wish I could say I was stunned by his revelation, but I wasn’t. Because, tracking strategic plans...

Create Values That Support Your Culture

Oct 25, 2022 | Strategic Planning

If you’re like most organizations today, you’re struggling to attract, train, develop, promote, and retain great team members. Heck, you’re struggling to find and retain team members - regardless of how great they may be! You’re also dealing with a myriad of supply chain and pricing issues, social and political divisiveness, altered expectations of ‘the workplace’, and much more. All of these pressures make ‘just doing what you do’ a true challenge. So how do you attract, train, develop,...