Barriers to Strategy Execution

Strategy execution is the single hardest challenge in business.

What makes it so tough?

Here's a list of the primary execution challenges, based on surveys of organizational leaders:

• Inability to manage change effectively or overcome internal resistance to change.
• Strategy conflicts with the existing organizational structure.
• Poor or inadequate information sharing among individuals or business units responsible for strategy execution.
• Unclear communication of responsibility and/or accountability for execution decisions or actions.
• Employees' lack of feeling of ownership of a strategy or execution plan.
• Lack of guidelines or a model to guide strategy execution.
• Lack of understanding of the role of organizational structure and design in the execution process.
• Inability to generate buy-in or agreement on critical execution steps or actions.
• Lack of incentives or inappropriate incentives to support execution objectives

BOTTOMLINE: "Poor or vague strategy" is also listed, but it's relatively low on the list.

Looking for a breakthrough vision for how to overcome these challenges? Read the best-seller: Six Disciplines® Execution Revolution: Solving The One Business Problem That Makes Solving All Other Problems Easier by Gary Harpst.