Week 7 Linking Strategy to Execution (Lecture) .pptx
- 2. LEARNING OUTCOMES • Understand the Importance of Linking Strategy to Execution: Students will be able to explain the critical role of aligning strategy with execution in agile businesses to ensure that organizational goals are achieved efficiently. • Apply the OKRs Methodology: Students will learn to effectively to OKRs (Objectives and Key Results) to connect company-wide objectives with measurable outcomes, ensuring alignment at every level of the organization. • Utilize Data-Driven Decision-Making (DDDM) for Strategic Alignment: Students will learn how to apply data-driven decision-making to guide business decisions, ensuring that actions align with the company's goals, objectives, and initiatives.
- 3. Introduction In the agile business, the link between strategy and execution is critical to enabling the organization to move fast, yet misalignment, or worse, confusion about what the corporate strategy is and how it relates to team strategy and execution often prevails in many companies.
- 4. THE 5 KEY STRATEGY QUESTIONS RobertMartin Trusted strategy advisor to the CEOs of companies worldwide including Procter & Gamble, Lego and Ford. Roger has written 12 books and 28 HarvardBusinessReviewarticles. RogerMartinhasdescribedhowstrategyistheanswerto fivekeyquestionsthatcascadelogically: 1.Whatareourbroadaspirationsandconcretegoals? 2.Wherewillwechoosetoplayandnotplay? 3.Howwillwewinagainstcompetitors? 4.Whatcapabilitiesdoweneedtowin? 5.Whatmanagementsystemsarerequired?
- 5. QUESTION 1: WHAT ARE OUR BROAD ASPIRATIONS AND CONCRETE GOALS? Aspirations: These are the higher-level objectives, such as becoming a leader in sustainability or innovation. Concrete Goals: These are specific, measurable targets like revenue growth, customer acquisition, or market penetration. Example: A cosmetic company aspires to become the leader in sustainable beauty products. To achieve this, they set concrete goals such as reducing plastic packaging by 50% in the next two years, achieving carbon neutrality within five years, and increasing their customer base by 20% in the next year.
- 6. QUESTION 2: WHERE TO PLAY AND NOT PLAY Where to Play: Identifying the markets and segments that offer the best opportunities. Where Not to Play: Avoiding areas that are outside of the company’s strengths or are too competitive. Example: A local fashion brand based in Malaysia must decide to focus on Southeast Asian markets, specifically Malaysia and Singapore, due to cultural alignment and growth potential. They consciously avoid entering highly competitive markets like the United States and Europe, where the investment required to compete with established brands is too high. By focusing on a niche, they can build a stronger brand and better serve their target audience.
- 7. QUESTION 3: HOW TO WIN AGAINST COMPETITORS How to Win: Focusing on a unique value proposition such as superior product quality, better customer service, lower prices, or innovative features. Example: A Malaysian mobile app development company decides to win in the Southeast Asian market by providing the fastest app development turnaround time, combined with 24/7 customer support. This gives them an edge over competitors who focus mainly on cheaper services but lack quality customer support. Their unique advantage—speed and service—sets them apart and allows them to dominate in a specific niche where customers value these aspects.
- 8. QUESTION 4: WHAT CAPABILITIES DO WE NEED TO WIN? Capabilities: The skills, processes, tools, and technologies required to deliver the strategy. Example: A fashion e-commerce company in Malaysia aims to win by offering a highly personalized online shopping experience. To achieve this, they need advanced data analytics capabilities to track customer preferences and buying behavior. They also require a fast and reliable logistics system to ensure timely delivery. Without these capabilities, the strategy will fail, as they cannot deliver on their promise of a superior shopping experience.
- 9. QUESTION 5: WHAT MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS ARE REQUIRED? Management Systems: The processes and tools for managing operations, tracking performance, and ensuring alignment with the strategy. Detailed Example: A digital marketing agency that specializes in influencer campaigns needs to implement a real-time performance tracking system. This system allows them to monitor campaign effectiveness, track conversions, and adjust strategy based on data. Without such a system, the agency would struggle to optimize campaigns and meet client expectations. Regular feedback loops and optimization processes are essential for the agency to sustain its competitive advantage.
- 10. Inlessthanfourminutes, Khairulsold80,000orders, generatingoverRM1million inrevenue. “TheviewersontheLIVE streamwerecompletely organic,andrecordedthe highestnumberofviewson aTikTokShopLIVEstreamat itspeak.” QUESTION 5: WHAT MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS ARE REQUIRED?
- 11. THE 5 KEY STRATEGY QUESTIONS
- 12. Dr. Eli Goldratt introduced the concept of strategy and tactic trees, emphasizing that strategy is hierarchical and not just one broad idea. Each level of strategy has a corresponding tactic, meaning a specific action linked to achieving that strategy. Key Concept: • Strategy answers the question: “What for?” (the purpose or goal). • Tactics answers the question: “How to?” (the specific actions to achieve the strategy). STRATEGY ANDTACTICTREES. Dr .EliGoldratt
- 13. STRATEGY AND TACTIC TREES. Businesses must ensure strategies and tactics exist at every level of the organization, connected by necessary conditions for success.
- 14. STRATEGY AND TACTIC TREES. Hierarchical Structure of Strategy Goldratt’s strategy hierarchy means that lower-level objectives (more specific) are prerequisites for higher- level objectives (more general). • Key Concept: ⚬ Each level’s strategy supports the level above it by providing necessary conditions for success. ⚬ The tactic at one level becomes the strategy for the next. Example: A retail company might have a top-level strategy of expanding into new markets. The tactic at that level is to conduct market research. At the next level, conducting market research becomes a strategy with the tactic of analyzing consumer behavior in target markets.
- 15. OKRS: BRINGINGTHE TEAMWITH YOU OKRs, or Objectives and Key Results, is a methodology for connecting company, team and individual goals and measurable results that was originally introduced at Intel in the 1970s. John Doerr, an Intel executive and Google board member introduced the framework to Google early in the company’s journey as a way of helping them align objectives and direction across the business as they scaled rapidly.
- 16. STRUCTURE OF OKRS • OKRs consist of two main components: a. Objectives: An ambitious, inspiring goal that the team is trying to achieve b. Key Results: Measurable outcomes of progress that allow you to see whether you’ve hit your objective or not. (e.g., 0-100% or 0-10 scale). • Key Concept: Typically, 3-5 objectives are set at each level, supported by 3-4 measurable key results. These objectives should be challenging but attainable. • OKRs provide a structured approach to achieving ambitious goals through quarterly measurable objectives, ensuring alignment and focus across the organization.
- 17. OKR - TRANSPARENCY AND ALIGNMENT One key feature of OKRs is transparency. At Google, everyone’s OKRs, including those of the CEO, are visible to all employees, ensuring alignment across the organization. • Key Concept: OKRs help build empathy and understanding between teams as everyone is aware of each other’s priorities, which improves collaboration and alignment on shared goals.
- 18. OKR - AMBITION AND GRADING PERFORMANCE Key Message: OKRs are designed to be ambitious and “stretching.” A score of 100% might indicate the objective was not ambitious enough, while a score around 70% is considered successful. This encourages continuous improvement without penalizing risk-taking. • Key Concept: Scoring is done on a 0-100 scale (or 0-10), and regular check-ins, often weekly, ensure progress is tracked throughout the quarter. Example: A team’s objective to increase customer engagement by 20% may only achieve 15%, but this is still considered successful, especially if it led to valuable insights that improved long-term strategies.
- 19. OKR - REVIEW AND ALIGNMENT TO STRATEGY OKRs are flexible and adaptable, allowing for regular review and adjustment to ensure they align with evolving strategic needs. They can be operational (short-term) or aspirational (long-term). • Key Concept: OKRs help bridge the gap between the organization’s long-term mission and the specific, measurable objectives at every level, driving progress towards bigger goals. Example: A company with a long-term vision to become a leader in sustainable technology might set team-level OKRs around developing eco-friendly products. These short-term objectives help them incrementally achieve their broader mission.
- 20. OKR VISIBILITY AT AN OVERALL ORGANIZATION L EVEL
- 21. OKR VISIBILITY AT AN OVERALL ORGANIZATION L EVEL
- 23. The DIKW Pyramid represents the relationships between data, information, knowledge and wisdom. It's important for organizations to have a clear plan for turning data into meaningful actions, reaching the "wisdom" stage. Being able to gather valuable knowledge and insights is a key strength. DIKW PYRAMID (DATA, INFORMATION, KNOWLEDGE, WISDOM)
- 24. DIKW PYRAMID
- 25. Data is a collection of facts in a raw or unorganized form such as numbers or characters. However, without context, data can mean little. For example, 12012012 is just a sequence of numbers without apparent importance. But if we view it in the context of ‘this is a date’, we can easily recognize 12th of January, 2012. By adding context and value to the numbers, they now have more meaning. In this way, we have transformed the raw sequence of numbers into information. DATA
- 26. Information is the next building block of the DIKW Pyramid. This is data that has been “cleaned” of errors and further processed in a way that makes it easier to measure, visualize and analyze for a specific purpose. Depending on this purpose, data processing can involve different operations such as combining different sets of data (aggregation), ensuring that the collected data is relevant and accurate (validation), etc. INFORMATION
- 27. “How” is the information, derived from the collected data, relevant to our goals? “How” are the pieces of this information connected to other pieces to add more meaning and value? And, maybe most importantly, “how” can we apply the information to achieve our goal? When we don’t just view information as a description of collected facts, but also understand how to apply it to achieve our goals, we turn it into knowledge. This knowledge is often the edge that organizations have over their competitors. KNOWLEDGE
- 28. Wisdom is the top of the DIKW hierarchy and to get there, we must answer questions such as ‘why do something’ and ‘what is best’. In other words, wisdom is knowledge applied in action. We can also say that, if data and information are like a look back to the past, knowledge and wisdom are associated with what we do now and what we want to achieve in the future. WISDOM
- 29. • Data (literal translation, ‘things given’) is used to refer to ‘facts’ or signals collected from the environment in some way and usually expressed in numbers. • Information refers to data that have been organised in a way relevant to your needs, so that they help you to answer a question that concerns you. DATA VS INFORMATION
- 30. This is where thorough brand research can help businesses improve their overall branding and shed light on: • How familiar customers are with a brand • The memorability of a logo & company name • How customers view a brand in comparison to competitors Types of data: • Primary or Secondary • Quantitative or Qualitative FROM DATA TO INFORMATION (BRAND RESEARCH CONTEXT)
- 31. • You collect yourself, by direct observation, measurement, interview, questionnaire or other means. Such data can be tailored to your own requirements (within resource constraints). • Methods: Interviews, Types of Questions, Focus Groups, and Questionnaires. • Tools: Online surveys (Google Forms, SurveyMonkey), social media polls, and face-to-face interviews. FROM DATA TO INFORMATION (BRAND RESEARCH CONTEXT) PRIMARYDATA
- 32. • Secondary data are other people’s ‘facts and figures’. They include the results of surveys carried out by other people, sets of government statistics, company reports or records, reports of research in academic journals, sets of figures available on the Internet, and so on. • Sources: Industry reports, government publications, competitor websites, academic research, and trade associations. FROM DATA TO INFORMATION (BRAND RESEARCH CONTEXT) SECONDARYDATA
- 33. 1.Structured interviews are those where you work out a set of questions before you start, and ask each interviewee exactly the same questions, in the same order, and even in the same tone of voice, so as not to inadvertently bias your results. 2.Semi-structured interviews are those where you ‘know what you want to know’, that is, you have a set of themes, issues or topics which you want to explore. 3.Unstructured (or in-depth ) interviews are even more informal and non- standardised. The interviewee is given free rein to talk about a topic in depth. GATHERING DATA (Primary data: INTERVIEW) INTERVIEWTYPE:
- 34. • Open - Open questions allow the interviewee to decide what is important to include in an answer. Questions which are too open can produce long and sometimes irrelevant answers. ‘What do you think about the recent redundancies?’ might produce anything. • Closed - Closed questions are those which tend to generate a yes or no answer, for example: ‘Were recent redundancies handled well?’ • Probing - Probing questions are used to explore answers in more depth. If you want to know more than the interviewee has given in an answer, you can say something like: ‘That’s interesting. Could you tell me more about the reasons for . . .?’ GATHERING DATA (Primary data: INTERVIEW) TYPEOFQUESTIONS:
- 35. • Definition and Use: Focus groups are a common market research technique involving 6-10 participants whose views are relevant to the research topic. • Role of the Researcher: The researcher facilitates the group discussion but plays a passive role once the topic is introduced. • Record Keeping: Discussions should be carefully recorded, either through video/audio or note-taking for later analysis. • Advantages and Drawbacks: Focus groups are helpful at the start of a project to identify key issues but share the same limitations as informal interviews. GATHERING DATA (Primary data: FOCUS GROUP)
- 36. • Popularity and Usage: Surveys with questionnaires are a widely used method for collecting information, often seen in market research or customer feedback after purchases or services. • Strength of Questionnaires: The primary advantage is their ability to identify variations in responses and explore relationships between different sets of questions. GATHERING DATA (Primary data: SURVEYS & questionnaires )
- 37. CONCLUSION Linking strategy to execution, applying OKRs, and utilizing data-driven decision- making are essential elements of successful agile business operations. Together, they create a structured approach that connects goals with measurable outcomes and enables informed decision-making, ensuring that organizational efforts align with long-term strategic objectives.
- 38. THANK YOU.
Editor's Notes
- #3: In agile businesses, strategy and execution must align to allow organizations to move quickly. Many companies struggle with aligning corporate and team strategies, leading to confusion and poor execution.
- #4: Context: Companies that fail to clarify how corporate strategy translates to daily operations may encounter inefficiency, miscommunication, and delayed decisions. Roger Martin outlines five critical strategy questions that help ensure alignment between strategy and execution.
- #5: Key Message: This question focuses on defining the overarching purpose of the organization—its vision—and establishing measurable, concrete goals to track progress.
- #6: Key Message: This question emphasizes the importance of focus. Companies need to clearly define which markets, regions, customer segments, or product lines they will invest in and which ones they will avoid.
- #7: Key Message: Once the company knows where it will compete, it must decide how it will win. This involves defining the company’s competitive advantage—what will make them stand out and succeed against competitors.
- #8: Key Message: Success depends on having the right capabilities in place. These include human resources, technology, infrastructure, and intellectual property. This question addresses what the company needs to deliver on its strategy and compete effectively.
- #9: Key Message: Finally, the company needs systems in place to ensure that the capabilities are developed, maintained, and optimized. This includes performance tracking, resource management, and operational oversight.
- #11: CONCLUSION: The five questions are interlinked/RELATED and require an iterative approach. You may start answering one question but then circle back to revise previous answers. This iterative process leads to a more refined strategy and closer alignment between strategy and execution.
- #12: Other than 5 questions approach, there is another way to link between strategy and execution for agile bussiness. It's what they called as Strategy and tactic trees. Important Insight: Businesses must ensure strategies and tactics exist at every level of the organization, connected by necessary conditions for success.
- #13: CONCLUSION: The five questions are interlinked/RELATED and require an iterative approach. You may start answering one question but then circle back to revise previous answers. This iterative process leads to a more refined strategy and closer alignment between strategy and execution.
- #14: CONCLUSION: The five questions are interlinked/RELATED and require an iterative approach. You may start answering one question but then circle back to revise previous answers. This iterative process leads to a more refined strategy and closer alignment between strategy and execution.
- #15: OKRs are a goal-setting framework introduced at Intel in the 1970s and popularized by Google, helping companies align objectives and measurable results across all levels (company, team, and individual). Key Concept: Situational Example: Google adopted OKRs early on to align their rapidly growing teams, ensuring everyone—from the CEO to entry-level employees—worked towards the same strategic goals.
- #16: Key Message: Finally, the company needs systems in place to ensure that the capabilities are developed, maintained, and optimized. This includes performance tracking, resource management, and operational oversight.
- #17: I still remember back then, we usually had a meeting every Tuesday morning, we called it as scrum meeting where we spent about 30 mins to update everyone's okr progress.
- #18: During my time, we will update our boss, head of PR at the time about our progress in certain score like this one. Let's say, the set OKR is to establish a connection (atleast 3 new) with local media such as Harian Metro, But I only managed to make 2 connections instead of 3. That is still considered as good because the the connection that I made is a quality connection that could led me to have another 5 connections through recommendation from the two gained media .
- #20: The CEO’s mission was to achieve RM1 billion in a year through the company's OKRs. While this may seem highly ambitious for a startup, they managed to reach RM500 million by the end of the year. This is still considered a strong performance, as OKRs are typically set 3 to 4 times higher than the actual goals to push for growth.
- #21: The CEO’s mission was to achieve RM1 billion in a year through the company's OKRs. While this may seem highly ambitious for a startup, they managed to reach RM500 million by the end of the year. This is still considered a strong performance, as OKRs are typically set 3 to 4 times higher than the actual goals to push for growth.
- #22: When organizations realize the full value of their data, that means everyone—whether you’re a business analyst, sales manager, or human resource specialist—is empowered to make better decisions with data, every day.
- #23: Organizations thant uses DIKW Pyramid can climb up the mountain of wisdom and gain a competitive advantage by supporting their business decisions with data-driven analytics.
- #24: Each building block is a step towards a higher level - first comes data, then is information, next is knowledge and finally comes wisdom. Each step answers different questions about the initial data and adds value to it. The more we enrich our data with meaning and context, the more knowledge and insights we get out of it so we can take better, informed and data-based decisions.
- #25: Organizations thant uses DIKW Pyramid can climb up the mountain of wisdom and gain a competitive advantage by supporting their business decisions with data-driven analytics.
- #26: By asking relevant questions about ‘who’, ‘what’, ‘when’, ‘where’, etc., can derive valuable information from the data and make it more useful for organizations.
- #27: As we uncover relationships that are not explicitly stated as information, we get deeper insights that take us higher up the DIKW pyramid. But only when we use the knowledge and insights gained from the information to take proactive decisions, we can say that we have reached the final – ‘wisdom’ – step of the Knowledge Pyramid.
- #29: The first key distinction to understand is the difference between information and data. Although these terms are often used interchangeably, they are not the same. Example: Suppose you had access to all the exam marks for all courses in every university in the country. This would be a (large) set of data. But if you wanted to choose a course for next year with a high pass rate, you would find it much more informative to be given only the pass rates for the courses you are considering.
- #30: This is the process of moving from raw data to useful information in brand research context .Here’s what it means: There’s a surprising disconnect between how most companies perceive their brand and how their customers perceive it. Even the colors you choose can impact brand recognition by as much as 80%, which means seemingly minor details likely have a bigger impact than business owners realize.
- #33: This is the process of moving from raw data to useful information in brand research context .Here’s what it means: There’s a surprising disconnect between how most companies perceive their brand and how their customers perceive it. Even the colors you choose can impact brand recognition by as much as 80%, which means seemingly minor details likely have a bigger impact than business owners realize.
- #35: 1) Focus groups, a technique widely used in market research, provide a way of exploring the views of a small group, (usually 6– 10 people) whose opinions are relevant to your research. 2) As the researcher, you facilitate the group. This should be a fairly passive role once the topic has been introduced. 3) You will need to keep a careful record of the discussion. This can be video- or audio-taped for later analysis. Alternatively, or additionally, notes are taken. 4) Focus groups can be extremely useful at the start of a project when you are trying to identify important issues or research questions. But they have the same drawback as informal interviews.
- #36: Surveys requiring respondents to complete a questionnaire are a popular way of collecting information for all sorts of purposes. You may have received various ‘market research’ questionnaires through the post or been sent a questionnaire after you bought something or made use of a service. The main strength of questionnaires is that they allow you to identify and describe the extent of variation in answers on particular topics and to look for relationships between positions on one set of questions and positions on another.