What else do strategy experts want to learn? Paul and Brechje share their quest to deepen in this third part of our blog series. Learning never stops, especially in our field. Strategy execution is complex and multifaceted — exactly why we love it so much. In our blog series, Summiteers colleagues share their personal learning questions and ambitions. After the stories of Dolf and Thijs and Lidia and Jurre it is now time for the third episode. Paul van Bekkum, co-founder of Summiteers, and Brechje van Elteren, management consultant, take you along in their quest to deepen. What aspects of strategy execution do they want to further understand? And what drives them to keep developing in this regard? A nice conversation about growth, challenges and the constant need for innovation in our profession.

Making conscious choices at the start

“Strategy processes are almost always surrounded by speed and high time pressure,” Paul begins. “As consultants, we often come on board a little late. The client has already started and has a certain deadline in mind. This creates a strong focus on getting started and producing content.”

As a result, important considerations are sometimes made implicitly, without consciously considering them. “When starting a strategy execution process, you have to find a balance on various fronts,” Paul explains. “But due to time pressure, we or the client sometimes make those choices unconsciously. What I want to learn even better is to draw more attention to these considerations at the start of a process and then have a good conversation with the client about them.”

The balancing act in strategy execution

Paul gives four examples of important aspects that deserve attention when it comes to finding a balance:

1. The balance between strategy definition and realization: “How much time do we take to define the strategy versus making sure something gets off the ground? People often rely on that strategy definition and think they can do the execution themselves. In practice, that is often quite disappointing.”

2. The balance between ambition and realism: “My natural style is: make it small, because at least something will come off. But that is not always what is asked. Sometimes you just want to paint a view, a dot on the horizon, the top of the mountain, and then make concrete what the first steps are.”

3. The balance between accepting and increasing current execution power: “In order to actually achieve a plan or strategy, it is important that the ambition level is in line with the organization's execution strength. If there is a mismatch between them, you can repair it in two ways: adjust the level of ambition, or increase the power of execution. You should then have a conversation with that organization: 'I think your execution power is limited at the moment. What can we do to increase it? ' Then the ambition level can also be increased.”

4. The balance between attention to content and attention to the team: “It's not just about what needs to be done, but also about which people are going to do it and how they work together.”

“In terms of content, I don't care what choice comes out of it,” Paul emphasizes. “As long as you make the choice consciously together and understand, acknowledge and manage the consequences.”

The hidden dynamics beneath the surface

For Brechje, the focus is mainly on the latter aspect: team dynamics and undercurrent in organizations. “Execution is really a profession, a capability,” she says. “It depends a lot on how you do that as an individual, but also as a team and as a leadership team.”

She sees that, in addition to the formal structures and processes, there are always dynamics in teams that can inhibit or reinforce movement. “You need formal structures such as organization charts and decision-making processes. But what also plays a major role are the underlying team dynamics that can accelerate or hinder movement. Having a more conscious view of this together allows us to do the right interventions.”

The power of the unspoken

“What I often see is that a new situation is emerging — there is 'shit', a new CEO is coming in, or there is another reason why things suddenly have to change,” explains Brechje. “But what doesn't always become clear is what made the previous situation not good enough and why the organization was insufficiently able to come to a good strategy or execution on its own.”

According to Brechje, this is about more than just formal structures. “It's about what's going on under the table, about old conflicts that haven't been resolved, about previous failed change processes that are still fresh in our minds, or about historic power structures that still work in the present. People stick to existing patterns because they were once a solution to a problem. If you can intervene on that and (h) recognize that things were useful in the past, but maybe not in the future, you will move forward.”

Paul gives a few concrete examples: “A new CEO comes in and doesn't understand why a major project is underway, but is afraid to intervene yet, because a lot has already been invested in it. Or someone just wants to show results within three months to show that they are there and something is changing. These kinds of personal interests color substantive decisions, but often remain unspoken.”

The courage to discuss it

“A team usually faces a considerable task,” says Brechje. “The better you, as a team, are able to explain what matters and what you find exciting about it, the more effective you become. This conversation should be conducted without judgment: this is the situation, what do we do with it? Grumbling or pretending it isn't there doesn't help.”

Paul adds: “It's about daring — having the courage to have these kinds of conversations. But we also need to think carefully about how we do that. If we have a good idea of the 'how', we can explain it to our people and also to clients. The 'how' makes it concrete and then you have something to say 'yes' to.”

Brechje: “I would love it if we all control this and we are also found there by our customers.”

What teams need to grow

“A practical approach can be to take a round at the start of a strategy process,” Paul adds.” Ask each other: “What is your personal intention in this process? What is your personal interest that you want to get out of this? ' These questions create openness about underlying motivations. Someone might say, “I want to make the savings this time that didn't work out last time,” or “I want to prevent us from getting stuck in execution later,” or “I want to show the organization that there is a long-term perspective.”

“Facilitating these kinds of conversations, especially when it gets exciting, is something teams can use support with,” Brechje emphasizes. “It's hard to break these kinds of patterns from within. That's exactly what I want to learn: how we can make the undercurrent visible and help organizations break entrenched patterns so that the strategy really comes to life.”

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