Barking Up The Wrong Tree December 11th, 2023 ---------------------------------------------------------------
Before we commence with the festivities, I wanted to thank everyone for helping my new book become a bestseller! To check it out, click [here](. --------------------------------------------------------------- This Is The Simple Way To Achieve Your Goals: 3 Secrets From Research ([Click here]( to read on the blog) Strategy. It's treated with a reverence usually reserved for sacred relics or the last slice of pizza. I love reading corporate strategy because Iâm a big fan of fiction. Typically, itâs a phrasebook of jargon that could make a dictionary weep. It says nothing, offends no one, has no clear actions, and makes no hard decisions. Itâs all âblue skyâ vision. Rarely are challenges mentioned or any insight provided. Itâs all mission, values, and lots of vague goals. And when we talk about âlife strategyâ, it gets even worse: most people have no strategy at all. Itâs like toddlers playing soccer; itâs cute, but nobody knows what theyâre doing. They're just running around, occasionally bumping into each other, and every now and then, by sheer chance, they kick the ball in the right direction. Strategy is powerful but this isnât strategy; itâs a strategy Halloween costume. Whether youâre trying to lose weight or vying for that big promotion, we can effectively apply business strategy to our personal lives. And you donât even have to do a SWOT analysis. How do we learn the best way to do it? Weâre gonna get insight from UCLA Anderson School of Management professor Richard Rumelt. His excellent book is â[Good Strategy Bad Strategy: The Difference and Why It Matters]( Ready to be strategic? Letâs get to it... What Strategy Isnât Everybody thinks they have a good strategy. They came up with an acronym. Even had it laminated. But the true first step is knowing what bad strategy looks like so we arenât misleading ourselves. You can identify bad strategies by whether they include any of these four signs: 1-Fluff Fluff is superficial restatement of the obvious combined with a generous sprinkling of buzzwords. Weâve all heard it. âOur fundamental strategy is one of customer-centric intermediation.â What does that even mean? It sounds like advice from a fortune cookie that's having an existential crisis. In our personal lives, itâs grand, vague statements like "I'm going to live my best life!" 2-Failure To Face The Challenge Bad strategy doesnât directly address the problems youâre dealing with. Richard says, âIf you fail to identify and analyze the obstacles, you donât have a strategy. Instead, you have either a stretch goal, a budget, or a list of things you wish would happen.â We tend to say things like âPersistence is everything.â But if youâre trying to get from NY to London and youâre headed north, more persistence isnât going to help much. 3-Mistaking Goals For Strategy Bad strategy is big on goals but short on a specific approach to achieving them. âTrying harderâ is not a strategy. This is like trying to bake a cake by just staring at an oven and hoping for the best. 4-Bad Strategic Objectives Strategic objectives are bad when they fail to address critical issues or when you have no way to put them into practice. You need to know where you want to be but also how you want to get there. Otherwise, you might as well be trying to turn lead into gold. And letâs be honest, the last time someone tried that, they ended up with a pile of worthless metal and mercury poisoning. So what is strategy? The Definition Of Strategy Goliath is like Mike Tyson in his prime and he even has armor and a javelin. David is a boy with a sling. But David notices Goliathâs armor doesnât cover his face. The kid slings a rock right into Goliathâs forehead and itâs over in round one. All the bookies in the Valley of Elah were stunned. Richard says, âGood strategy works by focusing energy and resources on one, or a very few, pivotal objectives whose accomplishment will lead to a cascade of favorable outcomes.â You donât decide on a strategy because the options are not always obvious. You design a strategy. And thatâs accomplished by identifying high value opportunities and then coming up with a specific way to leverage your strengths to accomplish them. This is every leaderâs primary responsibility and, in your life, youâre the leader. Like it or not. Good strategies are simple and straightforward. âHis face is unprotected. I have a sling. Iâm gonna hit him in the forehead with a rock.â And if strategies are not that simple, beware. More PowerPoint slides or more âmanifestingâ donât make a bad strategy better. So how do we design our strategy? Richard says it comes down to the strategyâs âkernel.â That has three parts: diagnosis, guiding policy, and coherent action. Diagnosis You've got it all mapped out â career, family, retirement â but you've failed to identify key obstacles. You know, like reality. Many seem to think strategy is akin to thinking happy thoughts and waiting for success to rain down like confetti. But, no, strategy is not just listening to your overly optimistic aunt who shares inspirational quotes on Facebook. You need to think about obstacles. The stuff thatâs causing you problems. No, itâs not fun. It means facing uncomfortable truths. This can feel like you're that character in a horror movie who decides to investigate the creepy noise in the basement. What problems are you having? What is getting in the way of you getting what you want? You need to think about the challenges and any competition you might face â not just your goals. Goals that donât consider obstacles are just dreams. What is stopping you from accomplishing those goals and how will you deal with them? When doing your diagnosis, you want to take the messy complexity of reality and reduce it to a simpler story that focuses on the critical aspects. This allows you to compare it to analogous situations where good responses may be more obvious. So youâve done your diagnosis. Whatâs next? A Guiding Policy A good guiding policy tackles obstacles identified in the diagnosis by finding leverage points, sources of advantage. But it doesnât specify action just yet. Where should you focus your energy to create a winning solution to overcoming the obstacle? Obstacle: Goliath, who looks like someone bred a WWE wrestler with a silverback gorilla. Guiding Policy: His armor doesnât protect his face... Hmmm. Coming up with a good guiding policy requires honesty, insight, and the ability to see the forest for the trees, not just complaining about the type of trees and the lack of cellphone reception in the forest. A good guiding policy is focused and simple. Now âfocused and simpleâ sounds good but this is often where the problems come from. Strategy is about what you do but itâs even more about what you donât do. âFocused and simpleâ means tough choices. You canât do everything and if you try, thatâs fewer resources youâll have to deal with whatâs important. Too many priorities = no priorities. David didnât start slinging rocks all over the place. And tough choices often mean irritating people. A good strategy is not about making everyone happy. That's the job of a clown at a children's party, not a strategist. In corporate life, universal buy-in usually means you didnât make the tough choice because shifting focus almost always means giving power or resources to one group over another. And in personal strategy, it means devoting less time, energy and money to one area of your life and more to another. Everyone is not going to be happy and thatâs why we donât make tough choices and thatâs often why strategies fail. Okay, your guiding policy is clear and so beautiful it could bring a tear to a glass eye. The strategist in you deploys your mental ad blocker and you focus. Now itâs time to act... Coherent Action Some people merely call their guiding policy a strategy and pretty much stop there. Believe it or not, you actually need to do things and carry that policy out. It's the difference between saying you're going to learn Spanish and actually downloading Duolingo â and then, unlike most of us, actually using it. So set a âproximate objective.â Yes, that sounds like it was invented by a group of monks who've taken a vow of practicality. What it means is a very specific action to follow through on your guiding policy, clear the obstacle and make progress. Make it a crystal clear target that you can reasonably achieve. This not only makes sense in the abstract but itâs powerful emotionally â you can see what youâre trying to do and it feels do-able. Thatâll motivate you. Proximate Objective: Rock, meet forehead. Okay, weâve covered a lot. Letâs round it all up and learn the dead simple way to get yourself ready to conquer your goals... Sum Up This is how to be strategic and achieve your goals:
- What Strategy Isnât: Fluff, not facing the challenge, mistaking goals for strategy and bad strategic objectives are all signs of a bad strategy. You're basically crossing your fingers and hoping the universe is in a really giving mood.
- What Strategy Is: âGood strategy works by focusing energy and resources on one, or a very few, pivotal objectives whose accomplishment will lead to a cascade of favorable outcomes.â Yes, this phrase sounds like something a LinkedIn influencer would say while trying to sell you a webinar. But it makes sense and it works.
- Diagnosis: Be honest about what obstacles youâre facing. Without that, strategy is just business improv. And nobody â I repeat, nobody â wants to see accountants and middle managers doing improv.
- Guiding Policy: How can you apply your strengths to the weaknesses of the obstacle and create leverage to overcome them? You need to focus. Trying to do too many things, avoiding tough choices and thinking youâre going to please everybody might be why you cry in the shower.
- Coherent Action: If your strategy is all goals and no action, it's not a strategy; it's a daydream with bullet points.
So how do you get started? You need to know what you want to achieve. This can be a problem for a lot of people. But itâs not that hard â in fact, itâs quite easy. Quick story: Itâs 1890 and multi-millionaire Andrew Carnegie is holding court at a cocktail party. People are hanging on his every word. Frederick Taylor approaches. He was famous as an expert on helping people organize their work. Carnegie looked at him and said, âYoung man, if you can tell me something about management that is worth hearing, I will send you a check for ten thousand dollars.â Ten grand then was about $300,000 today. It was probably more of a status challenge than a real offer. Everyone turned to look at Taylor... âMr. Carnegie,â Taylor said, âI would advise you to make a list of the ten most important things you can do. And then, start doing number one.â A week later, Taylor received a check for ten grand. Sounds ridiculous, right? This is the most basic advice in the world. Every corny self-help book recommends this. Why in the world would Carnegie â an amazing businessman by any measure -- see this as valuable? The list wasnât that valuable. But actually making the list was incredibly valuable. We talked about the importance of tough choices. And making a list forces you to decide whatâs important and whatâs possible. Taylorâs list got Carnegie to reflect on what mattered most to him â and to consider ways of getting there. Business fads come and go. Self-help tricks come and go. We love shiny new things. But whatâs important is making choices that don't make future-you want to time travel back and slap some sense into present-you. So make a list. Consider what's important to you. Think about the obstacles. Discover where the obstacles are weak and where you are strong to create points of leverage. And then... Rock, meet forehead. ***If you are one of those lovely people who bought "Plays Well With Others" please leave a review on Amazon [here](. Thanks!*** Email Extras Findings from around the internet... + Want to know a fun way to increase longevity? Click [here](. + Want to know how messy people can learn to be tidier? Click [here](. + Want to learn how to be more creative? Click [here](. + Miss my prior post? Here you go: [This Is The Emotionally Intelligent Way To Communicate With Kids](. + Want to know what to do if Netflix keeps recommending lousy stuff? Click [here](. + You read to the end of the email. HA! That was part of my strategy all along. (Seriously, thanks for reading.) Batten down the hatches -- it's Crackerjack time: I, for one, would say it is about time that a theoretical physicist sat down and evaluated all the top time travel movies on both scientific accuracy and entertainment value. FINALLY. To check it out, click [here](.
Thanks for reading!
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