Category: Strategy

Leadership Quote: It Is Only As We Develop Others…

March 30, 2014 by Elisa SpainNo Comments

This month’s leadership quote:

“It is only as we develop others that we permanently succeed.”

-Harvey S. Firestone

As leaders, we truly have only one job: to develop others. The success of our organizations rests entirely in the hands of the people who build our products and deliver the service to our customers. So, we have two choices, we build the products and deliver the service ourselves or… we develop the leaders who work for us, and they, in turn, develop their teams.

When we choose the latter, we permanently succeed because we have built a sustainable enterprise.

Elisa K. Spain

Did I Delegate Or Did I Abdicate?

March 23, 2014 by Elisa Spain1 Comment

Here’s a simple test to know if you have delegated or abdicated.

At what point in the process will I know if my expectations were met?

Hmm… guess that means if my intention is to delegate, I must take the following 5 actions:

Clearly outline my expectations
Check-in to see if my expectations were understood
Agree how both progress and outcome will be monitored and measured
Agree when and how progress will be reported
Agree when and how progress will evaluated and adjustments made

You might be asking yourself at this point, “seems a lot of process; do I have to do this every time I ask someone to do something for me?”

This decision of course, is yours to make.

Meanwhile I will share a personal story that happened years ago and reminded me of the value of following these five steps, and following the DIME Method, whenever I assign work to someone else.

I emailed a document to my virtual assistant, asking simply, “please clean up this document and send it to FedEx to make into a poster.” What I had in my head was a black and white, 24×36 printed document that I could roll up and take with me to a meeting and then throw away at the end of the day. The cost of this type of document is about $5.

When I arrived at FedEx, my bill was $100 and what they had ready for me was a full color, 24×36 printed document, mounted on a board and laminated.

Which do you want? And, have you made that clear?

When Was The Last Time You Went On A Date?

March 9, 2014 by Elisa SpainNo Comments

You are probably wondering why I am asking this question and what dating possibly has to do with a leadership blog…

Actually, this topic comes up frequently in my coaching sessions. Business it seems, is a lot like dating…

So, here are some dating and business best practices I’ve learned along the way:

Be authentic.
Be respectful.
Be clear on what you are looking for in a partner, a customer, an employee or a vendor.
Be clear what it is you bring to the table and be realistic. That high powered CFO may be great in a Fortune 500 company, but is she really what your $30mm company needs?
Put yourself in situations to meet new people that fit. No matter what anyone tells you, it’s not a game of numbers, it’s all about defining and measuring fit.
That wild guy or gal you wouldn’t bring home to Mom, is probably not going to be your SO or your best customer, no matter what he is willing to pay.
As soon as you meet “Mr. or Ms. right”, go out with someone else (when we get fixated on winning one partner, customer, employee, we can appear desperate. As Vistage speaker, Tom Searcy says, “play like you have nothing to lose.”
Go on a date with anyone once (okay, not someone you know is an ax murderer).
Go on a second date, if there was a spark of interest.
When she says she needs some time alone, or the prospect doesn’t get back to us right away, its not the time to call a day later and suggest coffee.
Once you have made a commitment, be committed. Give your customer, employee, vendor a chance to right a wrong.
And.. when a relationship fails (or the service is consistently poor), don’t drag out the exit. End it, learn from your mistakes, decide what to look for next round and start the cycle again.

For an amusing, albeit somewhat crass, perspective on the subject:

http://www.buzzfeed.com/kristinchirico/ways-building-a-startup-is-just-like-dating

Leadership Quote: We can't solve problems…

January 26, 2014 by Elisa SpainNo Comments

This month’s leadership quote:

“We can’t solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them.”

-Albert Einstein

Typically when we discover a problem, we bring together the same team that was involved when we first launched the new product, new division, new whatever, that led to the problem we are now facing.

What if instead, we asked people who weren’t involved at the beginning to look at the situation and give us questions to consider and offer possible solutions?

Perhaps you can gather a new team to look at the problem with fresh eyes.

Or, consider asking people outside your business.

Each month Vistage members have the opportunity to ask their private advisory board to bring that different kind of thinking to the challenges they face.

Wherever you choose to go when problems arise, it’s that fresh view that leads to better results.

Why Now?

January 12, 2014 by Elisa SpainNo Comments

Continuing the beginning of year theme of strategic planning. The question is, why diversify my business now, when everything is going so well?

Anyone who has hired an investment advisor knows, all of them advise first and foremost, to build a diversified portfolio. And, despite all the data supporting the long term benefit of diversification, some investors believe they can time the market. There are LOTS of stories in the investment press about the risks and consequences of market timing.

Those of you who are frequent readers know that my background is in financial services and investments and I often compare running a business to managing an investment portfolio. And, as with some stock market investors, when it comes to our businesses, we frequently ignore our advisors and the diversification advice they give. We have a great product or service, we are making money, we think “if it ain’t broke, why fix it?”.

Over the years, I have worked with a number of businesses and watched this process unfold…

Business is great, there are industry measures that indicate the product or service is maturing, but business still remains strong. Then suddenly (one could argue it wasn’t suddenly), it isn’t strong anymore, in fact, the business has gone from significant profits to losses, seemingly overnight.

The thing about income statements is they are lagging indicators. If we ignore other key indicators, especially the external industry trends, it is easy to be lulled into market timing behavior. And as with market timers, by the time the CEO realizes the market has turned, it is often too late to adjust without incurring significant losses.

As you continue your planning for 2014 strategic actions, I encourage you to pause and ask yourself the following questions:

What are the trends in our industry; where is our industry in its business life cycle?
How does our product/service compare to others in the industry; are we a leader or a follower?
What is our current level of product/service diversification; where would we like it to be?
What new product or service can we begin development on this year that will replace our core offerings in the future?

How Do You Know When It Is Time To Go?

January 5, 2014 by Elisa SpainNo Comments

Whether you are a business owner, a professional manager, an advisor – or anyone who is engaged in an enterprise for an extended time – how do you know when it is time to go?

“Nothing is forever”, the old saying goes, and yet sometimes, perhaps even frequently, we stay too long. We watch professional athletes stay past their prime; and we participate in the debate about term limits for our congress; and yet, when it comes to our own engagements, how often do we look inward and debate our own need for term limits?

When I was negotiating my exit from the corporate world 15+ years ago, I remember a conversation I had with a friend. My friend asked me what I was going to do if I didn’t get the deal I wanted. My answer was, “I guess I will stay one more year”. Her response, “How many more years are you going to say, one more year?” It was in that moment I realized, it was time for me to go, regardless of the outcome of the negotiation. And… because I had made my decision to exit, I of course, handled the negotiation more effectively.

While this topic comes up every now and then with executives and business owners I coach, it surfaces mostly in a time of frustration. I wonder if instead it might serve us to ask ourselves this question as part of our annual strategic planning. What if, as part of strategic planning, every business owner or executive answered the following 5 questions:

What did I give to the business, other than my time, this past year?
What did I get, other than $$, from my engagement in the business?
How do my answers to #1 and #2 compare to previous years?
If my give/get has declined, what do I need to do to change this and do I have the passion and skill set to do it?
If I didn’t lead or own this business, what would I be doing instead?

My noticing is, that if we have asked these questions in the past and have stopped asking them, we may already know that it is time to go…

Strategic Lessons From David & Goliath For 2014 Planning

December 15, 2013 by Elisa SpainNo Comments

As you put the final touches on your business plans for 2014, or for that matter, your personal plans, I suggest a read or a listen to Malcolm Gladwell’s Latest Book, David and Goliath: Underdogs, Misfits, and the Art of Battling Giants.

The book is not about how the weak rise up and triumph over the strong, as you might expect given the title. Rather, the book is about how throughout history, people succeed not in spite of, but because of their disadvantages.

Gladwell begins the book with his own interpretation of the David and Goliath story describing David’s triumph as a function of his going into battle using methods unique to him, (i.e. working in his genius as I am fond of saying), fighting Goliath with a sling shot rather than hand to hand, as was the norm. David takes advantage of his small size and wins because he was innovative and confident.

Throughout the book, Gladwell points to examples of successful inventions and innovations that happened because entrepreneurs who, like David, were perceived as disadvantaged, used their disadvantage to win.

So, as you think about how you might win against the Goliaths in your industry, I encourage you to consider the following questions:

What do you perceive as your competitive disadvantages?
How might you turn these disadvantages into true competitive advantages?

Here is a 15 minute Ted Talk from Gladwell to inspire your thinking.

Managing Business Assets W/ Portfolio Management Risk Practices

September 1, 2013 by Elisa SpainNo Comments

Businesses are assets, right? What might happen if we followed the risk management practices of portfolio management in running them?

The “portfolio managers” of our business are our leadership team, our key executives. Business owners have a risk tolerance that leads them to be more or less involved in activities in their businesses.

What I observe as a Vistage chair and leadership coach is sometimes executives frequently feel either micromanaged or adrift and unclear of expectations.

When the business owners abdicate instead of delegate, only to jump back in when things are not going as they expected (but didn’t verbalize), this creates unnecessary risk; leads to outcomes we don’t want and drives everyone crazy.

What if, instead, owners and executives followed the same process as we do for our investment portfolios?

When we hire an advisor to manage our traditional portfolio of stocks and bonds, the first thing they want to know is the answer to the following two questions:

Will you delegate full responsibility for managing your portfolio to me? or
Will the account be co-advised? Meaning, before I make a purchase or sale in your portfolio, I must consult with you?

When the owner of the portfolio chooses #1, the client and the advisor work together to design a portfolio that meets the risk tolerance of the client, the advisor constructs the portfolio and typically the advisor provides reports, usually monthly or quarterly, that inform the owner of the status of their portfolio. Additionally, the advisor’s reports include a comparison of their performance to that of their peer group.

Sometimes, the owner of the portfolio chooses #1, but instead of delegating authority, monitoring the performance of the portfolio, and periodically evaluating the portfolio manager; the owner abdicates, i.e. moves on to other things and ignores the portfolio manager.

I heard a sad story from a friend recently who chose option #1, neglected the monitor and evaluation part, and didn’t discover the result until he needed the money and realized it was gone. The advisor was not dishonest, he simply made poor investment choices.

If you decide to try this approach, here are some questions you and your executives might consider asking:

What decisions will the executive have full responsibility for?
Which decisions do you want to co-advise?
What risks are you most concerned about?
What kind of reporting works best for you? Written, verbal?
What do you want to monitor, and on what frequency?
How will my performance be evaluated?

And finally the most important question,

What is our agreement as to how to give each other feedback when the outcomes or the process didn’t go as we expected?

Leadership Quote: Vision Without Execution…

August 25, 2013 by Elisa SpainNo Comments

This month’s leadership quote:

Vision without execution is hallucination.

— Thomas A. Edison

When leaders focus solely on vision and strategy and not on execution, put simply, nothing gets done. Successful leaders know that a vision is a destination that their team can rally around. They also know that while the vision is their job, it is a team effort to develop a strategy for getting there.

At the same time, once the vision and strategy are defined, results only happen with implementation. And only succeed with the monitoring and evaluation that follows.

In my experience, leaders who see their only job as generating the big ideas and abdicate their leadership role when it comes to execution are suffering from the hallucinations Thomas Edison describes. By avoiding learning about the people they lead, the technologies their companies use, the customers they serve, and numerous other crucial little things, they miss the key elements of execution.

This is why Vistage members share their vision, strategy and execution plans, are accountable to each other for all three and outperform their industry peers.