Fixing Strategy Execution with Commander’s Intent

It’s common to trip across articles or annual CEO surveys that blame strategy failure on poor execution. After all, few top executives are quick to say, “We executed fine. It was just a bad idea.”

Instead, the blame for strategy failure is placed on the shoulders of some amorphous collective with the name, “We” in statements such as “We didn’t execute properly” or “Customers didn’t respond as we predicted and we failed to adapt.”

While execution around strategy might have been flawed, strategy failure is almost exclusively a leadership communication failure. Specifically, it’s a failure of leaders and leadership to provide those responsible for bringing strategy to life with context and clarity for the desired end state and their role and parameters in achieving this state.