Sherpa Alliance

Traditional “Strategic Planning & Implementation” tends to go something like this:

• Deciding upon our long term strategic mission, vision and key success measures, where long-term might be 3-5 or 5-10 years – let’s assume 5 years for the sake of discussion;
• Deducing our annual goals for the coming annual period, making sure they are SMART goals (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Results-oriented, Time-Bound) not just wishy-washy, open-ended, feel-good goals;
• Creating an action plan for each goal and assigning responsibilities;
• Cascading this goal-setting and action-planning process broadly and deeply throughout the organization, with each part of the organization creating its bottom-up goals, action-plans and assigned responsibilities in alignment with those coming top-down;
• Aligning rewards and recognition with this hierarchy of goals to motivate achievement and having a performance management process of feedback and coaching to best assure success;
• Continuing this cycle on an annual basis, with some business-planning and budgeting thrown in the mix for good measure.

All very good and essential parts of a good strategy and execution process, but no longer enough.  In the “old days” maybe this traditional approach to “strategic planning and implementation” was enough to give us the agility we needed.  Not anymore!  With the increasing speed of business, pace of change and uncertainty, turbulence and volatility these days, this approach doesn’t give us the agility we need.  Here’s why:

• Because 5 one-year plans do not a 5-year plan make.  Traditional “strategic planning & implementation” quickly becomes about a succession of one-year plans of SMART goals.  Each year, action plans and assigned responsibilities flow out of those goals, creating a convergent focus on the detail complexity of achieving them.  Necessary, but not enough, as that can easily be an Eastern Airlines scenario in the making (the Eastern Airlines story in Divergence & Convergence).  We can become so convergently focused on the detail complexity of fixing the one-year bulb that we are not also divergently focused on the dynamic complexity of flying the 5-year plane.  Things can go into an imperceptible descent, that might later become a nose-dive, followed by a tail-spin, followed by a smoking hole in the ground.  Think Automotive companies (General Motors & Chrysler), Banks (Lehman Brothers & Bear Sterns) and Retail companies, amongst others, going bankrupt – the 747s of business!   If it can happen to them, it can (and does) happen to any of us.  What is Jim Collins Saying?  Traction Planning assures that we are fixing the one-year bulbs and flying the 5-year plane.
• Because goal-driven action planning and responsibility assigning tend to be predominantly left-brained, convergent activities, becoming departmental very quickly.  Agility these days requires a lot more right-brained, divergent thinking at the level of the business as a whole not just for the parts (departments, functions, lines-of-business etc) of the business.  The tendency for traditional “strategic planning & implementation” to become departmental very quickly reinforces silos and a focus on the parts not the whole, which further limits agility - systems thinking tells us that when we maximize the parts we often sub-optimize the whole.  If we aren’t careful, we end up with a very shallow strategy for the whole.  Traction Planning assures that we have a much deeper "horizontal" strategy for the whole, which we own collectively, before pivoting to "vertical" departmental strategies for the parts, which we onw individually.
• Because our agility can’t any longer be based on the rigidity of an over engineered annual cycle, when the landscape of business is shifting much more frequently than that.   Maybe annually used to be frequently enough, but not anymore.  Business has become like a dynamic journey on a shifting landscape and we have to be able to turn-on-a-dime, at least a lost more than we used to have to.  If we aren’t careful, the world has turned 45 degrees left but we are still going straight on because our annual cycle hasn’t caught up with it yet or because our goal-setting cascade is so heavily engineered and rigid that it is a huge effort to re-engineer it in the new direction.

Traction Planning (Traction Plan) is an agile approach to traditional “strategic planning and implementation” , analogous to contemporary approaches to “agile software development” (Think “Agile Software Development” for the “Soft-ware” of Organizational Agility) - traditional approaches to software development used to suffice, but not anymore.  Similarly, traditional approaches to “strategic planning and implementation” used to suffice, but not anymore.  Peter Senge puts it best, saying:

“The reason that sophisticated tools of forecasting and business analysis, as well as elegant strategic plans, usually fail to produce dramatic breakthroughs in managing a business - they are all designed to handle the sort of complexity in which there are many variables: detail complexity. But there are two types of complexity. The second type is dynamic complexity, situations where cause and effect are subtle and where the effects over time of interventions are not obvious. Conventional forecasting, planning and analysis methods are not equipped to deal with dynamic complexity”.  (The Traffic of Dynamic Complexity)

Unconventional times call for unconventional approaches - we need a much more agile approach than traditional “strategic planning and implementation” these days.  “Traction Planning” (Traction Plan) gives us that more agile approach, overcoming the shortfalls of traditional “strategic planning & implementation”.  It puts us in the driving seat of organizational agility translating strategy and execution into traction, with nothing getting Lost in Translation.  In Sherpa Alliance, we are interpreters, translators and facilitators:  Interpreting leading edge research and authors, combined with drawing from my own real-world experiences and those of my Vistage members and clients; Translating this insight into pragmatic concepts, models and tools which can have a practical impact at ground level; Facilitating the application of these with CEOs and their teams to make a sustained difference to their journey as an organization and a business. “Traction Planning” is at the heart of this work of interpreting, translating and facilitating:

• Traction Planning interprets leading edge research into the complexities of business these days:
  • Detail Complexity and Dynamic Complexity.  Wave after wave of dynamic complexity has washed over us in recent times, with ever shortening wavelengths in between. Traction Planning masters both detail complexity and dynamic complexity, sustaining the mental mode we need to avoid the dangerous detour of Simplicity this Side of Complexity.
  • Divergence (Right Brain) & Convergence (Left Brain).  Avoiding Eastern Airlines scenarios (the Eastern Airlines story in Divergence & Convergence) requires us to be navigating a middle road of divergence (which is primarily a right-brained activity addressing dynamic complexity) and convergence (which is primarily a left-brained activity addressing detail complexity) sustaining the mental modes we need to avoid the dangerous detours of Being Half-Brained (Left or Right) and Giving in to the Pressure of Premature Closure.
  • 3-Dimensions of Latitude, Altitude and Longitude.  The whole problem/solution of being in the driving seat of organizational agility is a 3-diemnsional challenge, just like In the Driving Seat of your car.  Traction Planning masters the big picture of your business (latitude), the high level and low level of your business (altitude) and the journey of your business (the longitudinal dimension).  Traction Planning addresses the whole problem and solution of mastering the left-brained, convergence of detail complexity and the right-brained, divergence of dynamic complexity of this 3-dimensional challenge.
  • Triage.  As tragically illustrated by the Eastern Airlines story (the Eastern Airlines story in Divergence & Convergence) our attention span is our most limiting factor.  Managing our attention through time-management and priority management used to work OK in slower times, as they are good at mastering detail complexity.  With the increasing challenge of dynamic complexity, managing our attention has become more like an ongoing, dynamic process of Triage.
• Traction Planning translates this insight into a practical tool leveraging the power of:
  • Visual Planning & Structured Reporting/Presentation.   Traction Planning is a visual planning technique, leveraging The Power of Pictures to engage our whole-team in a whole-brained process of ongoing, dynamic triage, synthesizing a visual summary to get and keep everyone on the same page.  In its back-up pages, it provides a similarly visual approach to a  structured reporting and presentation format, equally efficient and effective in its synthesis, (avoiding the antithesis of an overwhelming variety of unstructured and long-winded approaches), not least as everyone becomes familiar with a common approach.
  • Integrative Thinking & Design.  Traction Planning promotes the integrative thinking of Agility by Design (avoiding the common traps of conventional thinking) as part of our ongoing dynamic process of triage, determining salience, analyzing causality, envisioning the decision architecture and achieving resolution (as laid as outlined in Agility by Design)
  • Electronic Capture/Ubiquitous Software (PowerPoint).  Our agility and ability to sustain an ongoing dynamic process of triage demands a real-time, on-line-all-the-time, electronic approach with ubiquitous software for all participants to use, without special licenses or training, which facilitates effective and efficient communication through reporting and presentation.  Traction Planning utilizes Power-Point to meet these criteria, with the bi-product of participants improving their Power-Point skills and their ability to convey complex concepts (in The Power of Pictures Daniel Pink urges us to “learn to draw!” as a new aptitude we need for the conceptual age in which synthesis is in greatest demand)
• Traction Planning facilitates a process of:
  • Enhancing Strategic Productivity.  It provides an electronic work product, built and evolved real-time by the team for maximum group memory and ownership, e-mailed to the participants the following morning.  Triage is readily achieved through coloring and bolding and Champions are readily identified, to divide and conquer the challenge.  Traction Planning gets and keeps everyone in synch on the same page as things evolve, enhancing communication, collaboration and coordination.  As a result, productivity at a strategic level is enhanced (Enhancing Strategic Productivity)
  • Handling Culture Regarding the Long-Range.  The structured reporting/presentation makes the expectations of identified Champions very clear and concise, with an inbuilt peer-based grading mechanism to give them feedback on their commitment to being the traction champion for their boxes/pages.  When executed with a regular cycle of Traction Plan Reviews (monthly and/or quarterly) there is nowhere to run and nowhere to hide.  As a result, culture to progress long range strategic initiatives is reinforced and peer-pressure handles  any excuses and shortfalls (Handling Culture Regarding the Long-Range)
  • Bringing Journey Orientation into Focus.  Traction Planning brings into focus the longitudinal dimension of the journey and keeps that journey orientation in focus, fixing the 1-year bulbs and flying the 5-year plane.  Business has become like a dynamic journey on a shifting landscape.  As the landscape shifts and/or the topography gets clearer and/or we have to deal with bigger underlying plate-tectonics, the traction plan has the agility to be re-shaped and re-triaged, to fit the latest shape of the challenge, hand-in-glove.  We can turn on a dime, put our foot back on the gas and be creating traction in a new direction, without incurring any wheel-spin, readily steering as we go.   The traction plan is built around core strategies serving our multi-year journey out of which our this-year plan of SMART breakthrough goals falls.
  • A System You Can Trust.  (Being Productively Paranoid – can you trust your system?)  One of the biggest challenges we have in business these days is having a system we can trust, to be adequately managing an ongoing, dynamic process of Triage, of our time, priorities and resources, without incurring wheelspin.  In reality, how many of us truly have a system we can trust to be sustaining that?  It’s not just a question of productivity.  It’s also a question of making sure we aren’t in an imperceptible descent (Eastern Airlines story in Divergence & Convergence) and constantly striving to bring perception to that which is dangerously imperceptible, requiring more flexible abstract thinking and mental agility to allow new light bulbs to start flickering on, which creates new work to be fixing new bulbs.  If you don’t have a Traction Planning process and tool as a part of your system, where are you going to capture these new bulbs?  In your Annual Plan of SMART goals?  Probably not as this is just something which is flickering on and it’s far too premature to try to create a goal out of it.  In someone’s Departmental Plan of annual goals instead then?  Probably not, for similar reasons, plus you’ll probably be met with blank stares and avoidance of eye contact when you ask for a volunteer - no one will want to have this implanted into their Departmental Plan of annual goals as it’s so poorly defined so far and could jeopardize their ability to meet the goals they already have, which are tough enough.  In minutes of meetings instead then, with a mixed bag of other stuff accumulating over time - is that a system you can trust?  Probably not.  Consequently, this new bulb, which is just starting to flicker on, and many others like it, may get lost in the shuffle, may not get included in the ongoing, dynamic process of Triage and, therefore, may not get fixed in a timely manner.  No big deal, unless this happens to be the one which creates or prevents an Eastern Airlines kind of scenario!  Don’t take that risk.  A Traction Planning process and tool provides a more agile approach which can capture and triage everything.
  • Driving Conversation.  At its essence strategy is conversation, period.  i.e. if we don’t have much conversation, we probably don’t have much strategy and we are taking an awful risk of having an Eastern Airlines scenario in our future.  Traction Planning drives a sustained discipline of conversation.  It gets you sensing/thinking differently, crystallizing/pondering different questions, shaping/making different decisions and setting/taking different actions, with much more agility.

Traction Planning (Traction Plan) interprets, translates and facilitates the whole problem and solution of being In the Driving Seat of Organizational Agility, translating strategy and execution into traction, with nothing getting lost in translation (Organizational Agility - Lost in Translation? ).  Even so, when first introducing the concept of “Traction Planning” to CEOs and their executive teams, it is often met with some mix of the following responses:

• “Why do we need to do Traction Planning if we already have an annual plan of SMART goals?”
• “It looks complex and like a lot of work – why can’t we do something simpler?”
• “We use the Balanced Scorecard, do Six-Sigma and have numerous Lean initiatives - why do we have to do this as well?”

You don’t have to do Traction Planning as well – it is optional, just like success is optional.  Successfully developing our organizational agility to the next level is optional;  gaining an advantage over rapidly changing circumstances and our competitors is optional;  sustaining our desired trajectory of success as a business is optional.  We don’t have to do Traction Planning, unless we do want to take our organizational agility to the next level - traditional approaches to "strategic planning & implementation" and "annual planning" won’t do it these days. 

It’s kind of like going to the gym – we don’t have to do that either.  And yet, the more we do it, the better we feel and the more we want to keep doing it.  The less we do it, the worse we feel and the less we want to keep doing it.  The greater we have fallen out of the discipline, the harder and harder if becomes to restart.  And yet, as soon as we do, after a few early aches and pains, we start to feel better already. 

Traction Planning is like beginning to use a new piece of exercise equipment at the gym, working a different set of muscles, keeping ourselves limbered up, strong and healthy for the new challenges we face these days.  The common responses mentioned above can also be dangerous detours (Dangerous Detours and Mental Modes to Avoid Them), potentially leading to Eastern Airlines type scenarios.  Traction Planning (Traction Plan) embeds these mental modes to avoid those dangerous detours.  It does not replace the other component parts of a rigorous strategy and execution process.  It complements them and creates more of a unifying whole, which can be a more agile system you can trust, with clear responsibilities and accountability (Anybody, Anybody?).