From Strategy to Delivery - closing the gap.

Running a large company is an exceedingly complex job. The organization’s managerial work scope is vast, encompassing functional agendas, business unit agendas, multiple organizational levels, and a multitude of internal and external issues that need to be dealt with. Closing the major gap between strategy and delivery, when it comes to new initiatives, requires colossal work from everyone in the company.

It also involves dealing with many people — shareholders, customers, employees, the board, the media, government, community organizations, and more. Unfortunately, executives who have a complete picture of how the organization works, how departments connect, and the power to deal with the above-mentioned issues, often have little time and context to make the changes necessary for the business’s success.

The gap between executives and employees widens

High executives see things with a clarity that brings the mission into focus. They spend years developing their management skills, learning how to advance initiatives correctly and efficiently get new successful projects off the ground. As a result, they can always see the bigger picture when their employees present a new valuable idea. They can see how it can be developed successfully and how it might fail.

Executives, of course, have a great deal of help and resources at their disposal. However, more than anybody else in the company, they confront an acute scarcity of one resource. That resource is time. There is never enough time to fulfill all of an executive’s responsibilities and keep up with everything that happens in the organization. Despite this, executives are responsible for the entire work of their companies.

New employees and managers often join an organization with great ideas for change and improvement, but they lack the experience to see the full picture. Perhaps, they don’t know whom to pitch their ideas to. Executives require thought-out moves and plans backed by data that can prove their success to greenlight ideas. An organization’s employees don’t have all the information available as an executive would. Instead, they have high context and information or specific processes related to their job. Both are things that execs don’t have due to lack of time.

Getting stakeholder buy-in

This results in situations where an executive likes the idea pitched to them but needs it verified by a particular stakeholder. They might also need real numbers from the finance department to back it up. Getting hold of stakeholders or financial reports might prove difficult for a manager. On the other hand, that stakeholder might not have time to chime in or misses the briefing because they’re too busy. Moreover, Finance might not have the time to run the calculations required or needs a request from the CEO to do it.

Meanwhile, the exec wants to know all the details before committing to the idea but lacks time to oversee the whole process personally. Here is where the communication barriers arise. As the details become too hard to figure out and people start pulling out. In the end, the gap from strategy to delivery becomes insurmountable.

Getting out of the loop

The company gets stuck in this loop, where valuable ideas are introduced, but employees are unable to secure the data to back them up. Other essential people whose opinions are needed to move forward are busy and, as a result, can’t be on the same page as everyone else. This makes it impossible for the executives to buy into them.

Repeating this process over and over becomes tiring for everyone involved. The friction between departments and employees, leaves them burnt out and not wanting to get involved in future initiatives. Looking at this situation, it’s inevitable that a consensus mechanism is required. That mechanism is Agreed.

So how can Agreed help organizations close this gap from strategy to delivery? How does the software successfully develop and implement all these valuable ideas that seem destined to fail or be forgotten?

Over the past 20 years, a key process has been developed to pitch new initiatives and get things done in organizations with no surprises. This software is the solution to closing the gap between strategy and delivery. New initiatives can be shared quickly throughout the organization, strategies become less rigid, and improvement ideas can be picked up and implemented faster.

The platform facilitates the whole process of idea development. Agreed makes it simple for any employee to pitch their valuable ideas correctly, from ideation to evaluating costs, personnel, and risk. This process that people needed years to learn is now ready to use by anyone. You only need to have a valuable idea that you previously didn’t know how to put into a feasible plan.

Closing the gap with Agreed’s help

With Agreed, the communication barriers of the past that frustrated employees and executives alike no longer exist. Within the platform, people can communicate faster than ever before. New people can be brought onto projects immediately, skipping all the bureaucratic processes and getting straight to work.

Ideas can easily be backed up with real numbers. Validators from relevant departments, like Finance and HR, will help ensure minimal risk and help create a detailed business case that can be implemented quickly. This is how Agreed helps organizations close the gap from strategy to delivery.

The need for meetings to bring people up to speed or onboard is a thing of the past. Instead, employees simply get notified, and then they can check the idea and the documentation on their own time. They can make their own adjustments and comments as they go.

Agreed’s superpower is getting everyone relevant to a certain idea on the same page. It does this through its battle-tested processes. The platform has made it easy to have all the plans, data, and information all in one place. So anyone new that comes aboard can be brought up to speed in record time.

If executives want someone else to give their opinion, they can leave a comment, and that person will be part of the team in no time. These new team members share their views and worries about the ideas and contribute to their successful implementation.

Last words

This mechanism that brings everyone together makes it possible to get easy buy-in from executives. The idea gets developed according to the process, with the execs monitoring its progress. Everyone whose opinion was needed has been brought aboard, and they give their approval. The last thing to do is execute the plan and make sure it succeeds.

We see organizations struggling every day trying to close the huge gap between strategy and delivery. They don’t have all the information and can’t collaborate on new ideas and projects within the company. It’s an inevitable problem that comes with growth. And we finally have a solution. A solution that has been tested repeatedly for more than 20 years and succeeded. A consensus mechanism that makes sure everyone can see the whole picture, and be on the same page.