Tommes Snels
For 25 years now, I've been helping organisations change themselves, over the last 8 years through Groupmapping. Driven by a systemic philosophy of collaboration, I'm working on solving complex issues. Find out more? Check out our site or socials or contact us.
The power of strategy execution
My passion lies in 'bringing them to execution' of strategy. For how beautiful is a strategy that is not only understood, but also really felt by everyone in the organisation? What people can do in their daily work? Which not only adds value to immediate stakeholders, but also contributes to a better world?
Too often, strategy ends up as a beautifully designed document that disappears into a drawer. Employees—the people actually making things happen—only encounter it through revised KPIs or during an annual review. They have to find the substance, and especially the “why”, for themselves. It can and should be different.
A strategy that does work
Our first joint piece of music was delivered in 2018. The core was one of the first talks with the CEO of a large engineering firm. When asked what he wanted to achieve with a different way of strategy development and communication, he said after some firm sparring: "I just want to have a good discussion about strategy and how we are working on its realisation in four months' time with any colleague."
Big events, co-creation and... a talking box?
We got everything out of the box: compelling events, creative means of communication, leadership pathways, co-creation with employees from all layers, extreme writing sessions (which brought us to strong content in a short time) and... the StrategyBox. Yes, really. A box with instructions and audio .. including the recognizable voice of colleague Paul, who was very often heard at some point. But it worked.
Everybody turn on . . without externals
What happened then was magical. Around the StrategyBox movement and involvement arose. Leaders themselves started working with their teams as we intended. No consultants, no external project team. Just together understand the strategy document, translate it into their own practice and daily work. In a few weeks some 2000 employees were included in the story. They were allowed to find something of it, feedback was collected and incorporated into the strategy. The ownership shifted from 'they' to 'we'.
No implementation phase required
I never forget the moment during a work session with the strategy team. Someone said: "We also have to think about implementation, of course..."
- Quiet for a second.
- "But... you don't have to do that anymore, do you? We're already working on it?"
- "Everyone's already working on this Strategy Box?"
- "Wait a minute... that means we're skipping the whole implementation phase?"
- "That's gonna save you six months!"
The only thing that was left in the head was the 'half year', not in reality, the strategy had already been brought to life by the people themselves, which is exactly what we need to do: bring strategy to life, carried by the organisation itself.
From pilot to approach
We have been doing tens of similar change projects for years now, always with the same ambition: to make strategy execution concrete, understandable and meaningful. We continue to improve our approach: faster, smarter, with more experience and less hassle. Sometimes standardized, sometimes completely customized. But always with the human centre. Because in the end, we want to spend most of our day on fun work, with fun people and achieve fun results together. Right?
* Before I joined Groupmapping, the team also made impressive contributions to major change projects. Think of the integration of Vodafone and Ziggo or the accompanying of an ambitious IT programme at Akzo Nobel.
Sharper, faster, smarter: I want that too!
Contact us to explore the possibilities together.