The StratExec Process
Work life consists of three AGENDAS:
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OPERATIONAL - Daily Routines (running the day to day business processes and challenges). This one will shout for your daily attention.
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FINANCIAL - Managing issues related with money. If you do not take care of it, your accountant, your creditors, the government and/or the bank will not let you get too far away.
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STRATEGIC - Working on designing a plan for a better future. Usually what you do if and when you have time left from the other two agendas.
The challenge here is to FORCE yourself to faithfully execute your STRATEGIC AGENDA. If you do not, your organization (1 employee or 100,000) will fail (slowly or fast, but painfully). As simple as that. Guaranteed. The world is moving fast, and you will stay way behind if you do not charge ahead developing a more competitive organization... or one that has no competition at all.
What to expect, as a minimum, in terms time investment requirement:
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Two and a half days annually for you and your strategic team (next section, could be you and your dog, if you are a start up) to work on this your StratExec framework (back to back, or within the same month, at least one full, other minimum half day sessions - ALL WITHIN 4 weeks). There is NO FUTURE without planning.
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Three to ten days in every quarter so that individual or teams execute the strategic projects. There is NO PROGRESS without execution.
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Half to one day every Quarter for formally following up on the execution of strategic projects and for reviewing/advancing the strategic framework. Execution tends to become very POOR without follow up.
Like everything in life, if you dedicate responsibly and enthusiastically to this process (and to your wellbeing), forever, you should get substantial benefits.
Assignment (to be completed during the next 24 hrs, but ideally right now!): Select and separate the dates for the 2.5 days of initial StratExec annual session(s) with your Strategic Team and for the 3 Quarterly Follow up sessions thereafter in your calendar. If you do not have a calendar, get one and set it up NOW (ideally one that can be managed through your smart phone, if available and synchronizes with a cloud based storage (Dropbox, OneDrive...) and desktop! One thing you don't ever want to loose is your Calendar-Agenda!