ABSTRACT
At this point we have successfully progressed through the development of a strategic plan and discussed the execution of the plan. What we have learned includes the following:
• How visioning works and what it is used for • The purpose of scenario planning • What a strategy map is and how it is used • The importance and role of core competencies • The composition of a vision • The creation of a mission and the purpose it serves • The importance of identifying who your customers are • How to dissect your mission statement into three or four
priorities • The purpose and use of an end state statement • The purpose and role of a priority-specific goal • How to decompose a priority into three or four objective
statements • The purpose of an objective definition statement • The use of metrics and how they are tied to the objec-
tive and to the priority’s goal statement • The role and importance of tasks and how they tie to a
metrics statement
Next we entered the world of strategy execution. Without this component a strategy is just a pretty sheet of paper. With the execution component, the strategy map becomes a living, working document that you use to run and optimize your organization. During the discussion of strategy execution we discussed the following:
• Governance and why it’s important • Cascading and how this drives ownership at all lev-
els of the organization • Strategy communication • Performance reviews and how they are executed • The critical role of objective champions who own the
efforts focused on improving a specific objective • The execution of strategy map tasks through the use
of Lean • How the Lean process works
• How to monitor and control the Lean process by using the A3 or 9-Step Opportunity/Problem Analysis Tool (Figure 14.2)
• The role of a Lean facilitator • The monitoring of the progress of the Lean event • The linkage between the Lean event and the strat-
egy map
But we are not finished. The strategy map (Figure 14.1) is a living document that requires regular updating. It is never completed. All the priorities are never met. All the goals are never achieved. Your organization is not yet ready to be escalated to organizational nirvana. There will always be things to change or improve. There will always be external factors that play on your markets. Best practices are constantly changing, and this constant level of change means that your top priorities today will not be your top priorities a year from now.
