Category Archives: Manage to Lead

Managed to Lead posts are organized into the categories below and are about what can be managed in order to be a better leader. There is a category for each of seven actions motivated by seven simple truths about leaders and organizations which, if followed, can help you change the world.

Finance Matters, Get Clear, Manage to Lead

How to get, and stay, in control of operations.

Leaders who are in control of operations compare their organization’s actual performance results to:

  • Past results to know whether their organization is trending up, down or sideways.
  • The results other organizations that are doing things similar to theirs achieve in order to know how well they are doing relative to industry benchmarks, especially relative to those who do best what they are doing.
  • Plan, budget, projection, or forecast in order to hold themselves accountable to what they said would happen.
  • Target or goal to know if it is time to be done with what they are doing!
The exhibit below provides precise definitions of terms leaders can use to talk about their organization’s performance with their leadership team and organization stakeholders.
Focus, Manage to Lead, People Matters

Personal Alignment

Great leaders learn what each direct report likes to do and what s/he is good at doing in order to help each decide to want to do what s/he is good at and likes doing. It is worth the considerable effort and thoughtful analysis required because it increases the odds of executive engagement, happiness, and high-performance .

How to line up what a worker is good at

Many people want to do something different than what they like and what they are good at because they believe others think that something else is more valued. Continue reading Personal Alignment →

Finance Matters, Get Clear, Manage to Lead, People Matters

Know the definition of strategy to help everyone stay on the same page.

The following are definitions of phrases that use the word strategy. They provide a useful way to think about the term and matters directly related to it:

  • Strategy is what people in an organization plan to do in order to “win” whatever game they are playing.
  • Strategic thinking is how decisions and actions are made in the immediate-term in a manner that is mindful of long-term implications and consistent with a strategy.
  • Strategic planning is the structured process that management uses to periodically engage leaders in advancing their strategy.
  • Strategic plan is a description of an organization as it presently exists and where it is to be in the future along with how it will go from where it is today to where it will be next on the way to achieve a long-term vision.
  • Strategic initiatives are projects identified as part of strategic planning and documented in the strategic plan that are to address what is most important to change next in order to increase the odds of winning.
  • Strategic management is what is done to deliberately operate and develop the organization in a manner that is entirely consistent with its strategy.
Focus, Manage to Lead, People Matters

How to contract and govern for success with each team member.

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Contract and Govern
Click for a PDF slide deck on how to Contract & Govern for success.

One of a leader’s most important jobs is to get and stay clear about what it is that s/he is counting on from each team member. Once the leader is clear, the message must be communicated to each team member. Often, leaders fail to engage in a rich communication along these lines, apparently because they assume that team members are somehow supposed to figure out for themselves exactly what is expected.

The steps presented in the slides available by clicking the above icon and in the following text make explicit a conversation that otherwise plays-out inside of the heads of those involved. When the conversation is explicit the leader and team member get on the same page and dramatically increase the odds of high-performance and fulfilled expectations.

Continue reading How to contract and govern for success with each team member. →

Get Clear, Manage to Lead

Five Questions to Outline Organization Strategy

WHAT IS STRATEGY?

There are many ways to use the word strategy and it conjures up different things for different people in different contexts. What for example is the difference between strategic thinking and a strategic initiative and strategic planning? (For an answer see this taxonomy of strategic terms.)

Leaders who are asked: “What is your strategy?” might want to reply: “my strategy for what?” The reason is that every organization necessarily has many strategies.  

There is a strategy for selling, a strategy for doing what the organization does, a strategy for managing and developing offerings, a strategy for recruiting, a strategy for developing people, a strategy for raising funds, and so on. Each strategy addresses how things are done now, and what must be done so as to achieve an envisioned future.

Answering the following five questions is a good way to start laying out an organization’s strategy:

Continue reading Five Questions to Outline Organization Strategy →