How do You Transition to Strategic Leader?

Ernie, most people struggle with the balance between action-driven firefighting and long(er) term planning.

The best advice I can give, that works for me, is to make (for instance) 60 days plans and a rolling 12 month plan. Force yourself (and your team) to review the last 60 days result and plan ahead. We divide the plan in two main categories: 1) Strategic improvement projects and 2) Short term issues.

The challenge is to keep the discipline and do it every 60 days so we try to keep documentation at a minimum (in ppt). Forcing yourself to plan ahead will also help you divide your time and attention better. Hopefully, the long term improvement projects will (over time) reduce the load of short term issues, freeing up even more time for strategic focus.

Much easier said then done. With all the data available today and the ease to process it, companies want to use it. But I think we are finding that getting accurate data and a common understanding of what it represents is an ongoing challenge. Getting into the details and making sure processes are in place to supply consistent information is critical. Is it a bad thing to be firefighting on this? Somebody has to do it or using the information for strategic purposes is worthless.

I agree with what Martin is saying, and to share with you what worked best for me is to develop a matrix called FMEA.

Failure Mode and Effect Analysis is very helpful tool to spot anything what may ''go wrong'' within the business process(es), understand how fast the odds can be identified, remediated and what are potential preventive measures which can be taken to remove the failures from the process or mitigate or transfer the responsibility (in other words options to manage the risks associated with the failure occurence]. FMEA helps a lot to get a clear picture on stability of the operational process, measures which should be taken and especially builds awareness across the business doamin/cross-domain, which result in lower or almost no so called ''surprises''.

I hope it may be a workable solution for your organization.

A problem solver (firefighter) should not be measured by the fires he extinguishes but the solutions he implements that makes sure that it never happens again and all the while building the organization they want to become.

It is a paradigm shift (i know...another buzzword, but it is apt) if you package or see yourself from a problem solver to a solutions provider and an organization (all context) builder. In short, don't count the fires but the solutions and the improvements.

Fires are just the result of inherent problems within the organization and the more fires you fight, the deeper the problem is. I have been in this situation before and I'd like to see myself as working myself out of the job (firefighting) and striving to get the organization "humming" by implementing solutions. There comes a time when you just sit in your office, and look out your window and can just feel the fruits of your labor.

Ongoing firefighting can lead to or be a sign of departmental or organizational overload. Rather than engaging in a process of continuous planning that means scaling the knowledge of one’s best talent to achieve optimal performance, we frantically run around addressing problems as they flare up. Operations tend to be tactical rather than strategic, moving from one crisis to another. As such, firefighting, however courageous and energetic, communicates the wrong message throughout the organization, presenting a model of effective leadership as frantic business, rather than disciplined long range planning that leads to value creation. A balance between firefighting and reflective inquiry is necessary for sustained organizational effectiveness.

This is a terrific question Ernie and something most executives struggle with. People generally have a strong bias to be a builder, a fixer, or a maintainer and when the organizational need changes, they can be completely blind to it and quickly become out of step with the needs of the company.

Things I have seen work are:
1. Be aware that this happens and keep an ongoing conversation with peers about where they see the needs of the company heading.

2. Get very clear about what needs to be fixed, and when that is accomplished evaluate what the right next step is...more fixing, pivot to grow, pivot to maintain?

3. Organize work to your strengths. Direct reports should be looking for ways to grow, so if there is a particular build or maintain task that is real drudgery identify how it can be a (legitimate) growth opportunity for someone else.

4. Re-frame the work, but not the talk track. I happen to be a fixer. When the fix is complete and a client needs a next phase of a project to really operationalize the changes, I frame it in my head as the next thing that is broken. But I recognize the external talk track needs to change, so it becomes "Now that we have the issue stabilized, we are going to use that success to grow top line revenue and optimize the cost structure."

5. Be honest with yourself. If you really are a fixer and just can't roll out of bed to go maintain a well running organization, admit it. Talk with the boss and work out a transition timeline that gives the organization the leader they need and gives you work you love to do.

Hope this helps!