In my experience, I have come across a lot of people and organizations that talk about strategy but very few of them talk about execution.

In fact, many of them spend a lot of time building and developing a strategy but don’t support their people with the tools and training to properly execute on them. There seems to be a major disconnect between the strategy that the executives painstakingly develop and how it is executed on the ground by their front-line staff. Just having a strategy does not mean that it will be properly executed.

From experience, I know that the best way to execute strategy is to ensure buy-in from the front-line as well as leading by example. Corporate culture dictates how your front-line staff will execute and if management is disengaged in the business, then the culture of the organization will also be disengaged.

I call this the utility mentality… where a company operates in a vacuum, has almost carte-blanche in what it charges its customers and how it spends its money. We see this often in many large organizations where executives get paid handsomely for doing nothing and front-line staff are frustrated, have no job satisfaction and just come in for a pay cheque.

Bain and Co. suggests that only 1 in 5 corporate strategies succeed. This has really nothing to do with the strategy and everything to do with execution. For organizations to squeeze out every bit of potential and success, they need to focus more on execution.

To be successful at execution, companies need to create a culture of execution and a sense of urgency. This is what makes a startup successful and also what draws people to work for them. It is after all, the most hungry companies that get the reward at the end of the game.