Back to Don SullDuring the boom, many managers assumed their companies excelled at execution. In fact, much of their success arose from strong economic tailwinds. Now that the winds have shifted, executives discover to their chagrin that their company’s execution engine is less powerful than they imagined. This post lists five of the top obstacles to execution in volatile markets.
5) Rely exclusively on process to execute. Many managers equate execution with standardized processes. They re-engineer key procedures and employ process disciplines, including six sigma, or total quality 
management to ensure continuous improvement. These approaches work well for activities–such as processing transactions or manufacturing cars–that can be laid out in advance and repeated thousands or millions of times per year with minimal variation. Process tools work less well for activities that consume much of the typical knowledge workers time, including coordinatinating work across a matrix or generating innovative solutions to unique problems. A study by Professors Mary Benner of Wharton and Michael Tushman of Harvard Business School found greater investment in process disciplines decreased innovation (beyond incremental improvements in their existing processes). Managers need a broader range of tools to manage non-routine work.
4) Chase too many rabbits. “If you chase too many rabbits,” according to a Japanese saying, “you don’t catch any rabbits.” In the boom, many organizations entered new markets and piled new priorities on top of existing objectives, confident they could do it all. Trying to implement too many initiatives at the same time dissipates resources and attention. Execution starts with leaders making hard calls on what to do, what not to do and what to stop doing. They then communicate their priorities throughout the organization and translate them into performance objectives for individuals and teams. Prioritizing initiatives should be management 101, but many leaders shy away from hard choices. Part of this comes down to the common equation of leadership with grand sounding things like “vision.” How many questions on your company’s management 360° assessments evaluate a manager’s ability to make hard trade-offs?
3) Vikings become farmers. Execution in volatile markets requires more than tilling the fields of your 
existing business model–it also demands aggressive exploitation of new opportunities that arise out of churning markets. The managers who seize these opportunities are relentlesss in pursuit but flexible in advance–pulling back and revisiting their plan when they encounter resistence and plunging forward when they find a market gap. These managers resemble Nordic Vikings, who attacked when they saw an unprotected spot, retreated when they could not win, and maneuvered their longboats to the next opportunity. Once Vikings seized a bit of land, however, they often stayed to farm it. Over time, they became farmers who valued the security of protecting what they had more than the adventure of discovering new opportunities. A similar dynamic plays out in organizations. Entrepreneurs who start a company resemble Vikings. As the business matures, the founders may leave for new adventures or settle into running the mature business. New employees join the firm for its perceived stability. What started as a Viking outpost becomes a farming community where employees value security over upside, stability over adventure. Firms need farmers, of course, but companies with too few Vikings on the payroll struggle to seize the opportunities that arise as markets churn.
2) Managers talk about the wrong things. Several studies have found that managers spend three-quarters of their time in discussions–formal and informal, one-on-one and in meetings, face-to-face, over the phone, and increasingly through email exchanges. Management, at its essence, consists of getting things done through discussions. Unfortunately few managers have mastered the four distinct types of discussions necessary for execution. Leaders must be able to structure and lead conversations to make sense of volatile situations; make hard choices; solicit and follow up on commitments to deliver; and make mid-course corrections. Execution stalls unless leaders throughout the organization structure these discussions, set the right tone, collect appropriate information, and skirt common pitfalls. Benign economic conditions blunt the need to hone these skills, but they are a matter of corporate life and death when executing in the face of stiff headwinds.
1) Worship false idols. All organizations that excel at execution put performance at the core of their corporate culture. Many companies, in contrast, value other things ahead of performance. They worship status, for instance, creating a hierarchy of VPs, SVPs, and EVPs, whose level dictates everything from the size of their office to the make of company car they drive. Status also protects them even when they fail to perform. Executives that wish to improve execution must send a clear signal that performance against agreed objectives trumps title, past achievement, or any other attribute. Performance is not the only value necessary for execution. Teamwork, transparency, openess to continuous change, and cost-consciousness also underpin an execution culture, but performance must lie at the core.
In the posts that follow over the next few weeks, I will explore several of these obstacles in greater depth, and discuss ways managers can overcome them.
