day 680: The One Big Thing

"So take this seriously. The Lord has chosen you to build build a Temple as his sanctuary. Be strong and do the work."

As an output of many strategic planning sessions is the distillation of the business objectives into the "one big thing" that needs to get done before all others. Once a business or an organization can clearly define and articulate what that one big thing is there is a certain clarity and alignment that will appear. But, getting to that one big thing is difficult, really difficult. With all of the competing priorities, getting to the one big thing means letting other things go and many times getting people to give up their pet projects or the areas that they think they must fulfill to move themselves forward. But, this is where we have to be disciplined and focused so that we can see what the one big thing is and not waiver. Organizations that can get there and and stay there are the ones that succeed. Those who try and do too much and become too watered down in their efforts and resources end up never finding the power of focus and alignment.

When King David told his son Solomon that the Temple was to be his to build, he defined for Solomon the one big thing that he was to do. David then challenged him in how he was to get the Temple built and what kind of leader he was to be, but this was all in the pursuit of building the Temple to the best of Solomon's ability. While in our own lives it may be hard to come to our one big thing, God calls us each and every day to bring glory to Him in all that we do and when we do that to spread His word to others. If we were to take on this as our one big thing, then we could know, without a shadow of a doubt, that the focus of our lives would be fruitful and pleasing to God. Today, consider what has been the one big thing to date? Is it what you want it to be or is today a day to reconsider, realign and refocus?

Reference: 1 Chronicles 28:10 (New Living Testament)

day 673: Strategic Shifts

"So be strong and courageous! Do not be afraid and do not panic before them. For the Lord your God will personally go ahead of you. He will neither fail you nor abandon you."

One of the scariest things to do in business is to conduct a real strategic plan exercise. When done right, strategic plans have the input of many stakeholders and should feel like a comprehensive 360 degree look at the business, the market, the opportunities and the challenges. Coming out of the study will be a set of new targets and direction for the organization. Then, whoever is in charge has to answer the questions of "why not?" to all of the great ideas that have been presented. These can be as daunting like, how to double the size of the business in a specified time frame, or adding to or shedding parts of the business, or even as drastic as changing course and entering into new business segments. Whatever they are, they take courage to adopt and fortitude to implement. Someone once told me, "Vision is imagining that which cannot yet be seen." That is what we do when we make strategic shifts, we vision what cannot yet be seen. That is why it is scary and why we need to be courageous and strong to make the shifts. Businesses, or any organization, need to undertake regular strategic evaluations to stay healthy, pointed in the right direction and growing.

We also should take strategic inventory every now and then to be sure that our lives are pointing the direction that they should. God has given us the direction and the path to follow but are we sure that those things in our life where we spend our time, our energy and our resources are aligned to that plan? It is one thing to know the direction, it is another to align ourselves in that direction. Just like the strategic shifts and the tough decisions a business may have to take, we personally have to make those same hard calls. And yes, sometimes it does take courage. But, God gives us His promise that He will go in front of us so all we have to do is follow Him and He will not fail us or leave us alone. To have that promise should give us all the courage and strength we need to make the necessary and needed strategic shifts in our lives.

Reference: Deuteronomy 31:6 (New Living Testament)

day 351: Long-Range Planning

A few organizations I am involved with are right now going through long-range strategic planning. The great thing about this kind of planning is that it is an opportunity to think big, think long and think creatively without limitations or putting boundaries around the thinking. After all of the ideas are worked through and consensus is gained on what is important, it is then that the hard work starts. This is when we sign up for the important initiatives and start to work towards how to achieve all of the long-range ideas. Long-range planning also means long-range working. While it is nice to have short-term deliverables so that we can see and feel achievement, much of the best work we can do is the work that is long-range, strategic and may never feel like it is totally done. A friend of mine, when I asked him how he saw his job going he started talking about the next 15 years and what he, or someone else, could do over that time frame. How many of us think in that amount of years when it comes to our jobs and what we can do for our companies? It is hard to think and act in long-term ways. We are so conditioned now for short-term results that we struggle to think about the long-term future in front of us. We should be grateful that our God does not think that way. We read in Philippians that God is with us for the long-run; "And I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue His work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns." If God is willing to work in us for as long as it takes, then we can do the same. We can look to the future and be the ones who are into our work for the long run. Those that can think and work in the long-range are many times those who are thought of as most strategic and those who others know they can count on. If there are areas in your work where you know that you need to think longer and more strategically, today would be a good day to start thinking and doing your own long-range planning.

Reference: Philippians 1:6 (New Living Testament)

day 153: Strategic Planning

While some leaders don't believe that a company or organization should have a strategic plan, I do. After many years of bring in business and being also involved in non-profits and educational institutions, the ones that I have seen do the best and succeeded beyond others have been the ones who created, adopted, aligned the organization against, and executed to a 3-5 year forward looking strategic plan. These strategic plans consisted of an agreed upon vision and mission, an understanding of the strategic challenges and pillars that can drive the organization, a set of short-term goals that underpin the plan and a supporting culture, talent base and people practices to make it all come together. It is a lot of hard work to create a strategic plan but when it is completed well and made real to everyone in the organization so they know their role in making the plan come to life, then all the hard work and time becomes well worth the efforts. There are people who make a living from facilitating and leading these plans because it is not easy to see around the corner and conceptualize the future. Most can't do it without the help of someone else to ask the right questions and open our minds to new possibilities and potential. Any one of us might be one who is looking at the same problems in our business the same way and getting the same poor results, when what we really need to be doing is to zoom way out until we can see the whole picture and think strategically. Again, it is not easy to do. How we think about our roles (as believers) in our work is a similar challenge. We can get caught up in the details and the worries within our work that we forget to remember that we are to be living out the purpose of bringing glory to Go with our work. We have to be continuously asking God to let us remember to see the biggest picture so we can work within that visible picture. God gives us a verse to help with seeing the full landscape strategically. He say in Jeremiah that we can call on Him to help see the unknown: "Call to me and I will answer you and tell you great and unsearchable things you do not know." It may be that today you wish you could see around the corner to the future, or see the bigger picture so that you know more to be better or to not make mistakes that could be avoided. God says that we can call on Him to help us in this area. This doesn't mean that any of us are going to for sure become great strategic planners and certainly He is not saying that we are going to become fortune (or mis-fortune) tellers. What I take from this verse is that when we get stuck and we need to see things from a different angle, perspective or vantage point, that when we call on Him to open our eyes and minds to new possibilities that God will provide us the vision that we need to be strategic in how we approach our work and our lives.

Reference: 33:3-4 (New Living Testament)