As I was sitting in Caribou Coffee yesterday morning waiting for a meeting, I was reading Carly Fiorina's book, Tough Choices (carlyfiorina.com) . She's speaking at the Willow Creek Association's Leadership Summit in August and I am really looking forward to hearing her. She's a straight shooter and pretty funny, from what I have been reading.
Anyway, I came across this quote yesterday. Carly was writing about the failed joint venture between Lucent and Philips Electronics, the inner-workings of Lucent, and all the challenges of working in a multi-billion dollar business. Here's what she said that caught my attention:
"Strategy is about making choices. Execution is about making those choices work."
I love and hate that quote at the same time. I would love to think that my leadership problems - and yours - can be solved simply by choosing a new direction, a new strategy. Some book out there has the magic formula for any problem I am facing. But it just is not true.
I give Russ Robinson credit for saying, "A mediocre strategy executed with excellence will win out over an excellent strategy executed with mediocrity every time." I am sure he said it better, but you get the idea. In the future I'll quote Carly Fiorina - she's better known and better looking.
Our success or failure in most every venture in life comes down to executing well. (Your strategy, that is. Not the people in your way.) And executing your strategy well often comes down to tough choices. Ugh.
Can I see my choices clearly?
What activities will I stop organizationally and personally so that I can devote more time to the tasks that are in the center of my mission and vision?
What do I need to start doing? Where do I need to improve? What about my team - staff and volunteers?
Tough choices. Which ones are you facing?
