Execution Eats Strategy

As many would know, I am an avid follower of professional sports and draw active inspiration from them (like many of us), a lot of which we have used at OfBusiness.

One of the key (yet frequent) situations that we face in business and in sports are when things are not working out for us, even when a lot of thought has gone in. Like in a business situation, you have put in a lot of process bandwidth, capital, and your best people after strategizing and piloting. Same when in sports, wherein after a lot of all-round thinking, things are just not working out in a game. We face this dilemma very, very frequently.

In sports, the action is simple. You just go to plan B, change your strategy. Or you just drop the team in the next match and get your next best in. You can’t just stop playing that sport if you are not performing, that’s not an option. (The best of managers and captains tell you that they always go with 3 plans for a game, each a backup if the previous did not work. And they will always have a solid bench for all the marginal members in the team.)

In business, we see a lot of our peers doing the same. Even if they have put in a lot of thinking time, they’d change strategy at the drop of a hat when faced with adversity, including even changing/ firing the people concerned. But never abandon the said situation. And continue the process iteratively.

For us, this method has just never worked at OfBusiness. If we have thought the business through and it’s not working, we push execution very, very hard; we do not change strategy; not till the very end. And at the very end, if we change the strategy, we change only once. If that too fails, then we just give up and stop the business (we have the luxury of discontinuing a business unit, geography, or product, unlike in sports). And this process for us is very fast, mostly within 2-3 months. We never change/ fire the team which is “at it”; we believe they are our biggest assets, and they will fire someplace else within OfBusiness. Most of us, being young generalists (rather than experienced specialists), helps a lot in the process.

It’s likely counter intuitive, but our method keeps us relatively more stress-free and well gelled as a team. Finally, that team succeeds. (Case in point are a lot of OFBians, who started their careers in unsuccessful ventures of OfBusiness (we have failed way more often than succeeded) but are going great guns now.)

For us, execution eats strategy. Mostly.

Read more from CEO speaks Column:-
– Rising While Down
– What’s in a Name?