Alignment and Execution in Your Business
I love operations. That was probably obvious by the title of this post, but it’s true. And as a COO, there’s nothing I love more — and want more for my teams — than to set clear goals; know how those goals connect to a bigger picture; feel empowered to get the job done; and have the processes to do so.
That’s all I want for Christmas: Alignment and execution in your business. And maybe some hot chocolate. I love hot chocolate. With the little marshmallows.
Anyway, if you’re reading this post, you probably want the same for your business — team members on the same page who are consistently hitting their goals. At Wildsparq, we’ve created the Wildsparq G.O.E. Model to help us accomplish alignment and execution in your business, and in the spirit of the holidays, I thought I’d share. It’s the Wildsparq Grid for Operational Execution, and once you’ve set goals for your team, you can utilize this five-step process to move each of your teams down the path of executing those goals…together.
How to Incorporate Alignment and Execution in Your Business
Ready? Let’s G.O.E.
1. Priorities
What are your team priorities this month in light of the goals you’ve been given? Make a list. Work together to determine the single most important item on that list. If nothing else gets done, what single item must be accomplished? Circle that one.
Now, if two of those priorities were possible, what would you circle? Repeat this process a couple of times to enable your team to clearly understand and articulate the top priorities for the next month.
2. Problems
If you really want to energize a team, a simple list of To-Do’s isn’t the way to go. You need real problems to solve. And you need buy-in from everyone.
Ask the question: What’s standing in the way of us hitting our goals and following through on our top priorities? Ultimately, you will have a collaborative list of issues, and once they are solved, team members will be able to see how they were able to contribute to accomplishing your goals.
3. Process
Determining the processes you will use to accomplish your goals doesn’t have to be burdensome. They should be practical and tailored to your organization — allowing projects and priorities to be broken down into smaller parts. There are a lot of project management tools out there that can help.
At Wildsparq, we use Trello to manage most of our projects. This tool allows us to create process flow and then track progress very easily. Regardless of your industry or team size, there’s more than likely a great resource to help prioritize problems and streamline them quickly through a consistent process. But simple doesn’t mean “easy.” Establishing processes will take time and focus on the front end, but the results will be worth the effort.
Steve Jobs once said, “You have to work hard to get your thinking clean, to make it simple.
But, it’s worth it in the end, because once you get there, you can move mountains.”
4. People
Once you understand your priorities, create clear problems to solve, and have established processes to help complete those tasks, it’s time to create clear roles, responsibilities, and accountability for everyone involved. Within most project management tools, leaders can assign tasks to team members with clearly defined due dates. This is extremely important because it continues to encourage buy-in from your team and allows everyone to feel integral to the process.
5. Progress
A meaningful process should be clearly evaluated at least once a month. We believe the best processes allow for intentional check-ins either weekly or biweekly. This gives you and your team opportunities to evaluate and pivot if something isn’t going according to plan.
There you have it – The Wildsparq Grid for Operational Execution. The G.O.E. Model. The 5 Ps. And we believe that it can work for you and your teams — to create energy, and accountability, and simply get things done.
I think you’ll agree that would make for a pretty good Christmas — especially if there’s hot chocolate, am I right?
Download a pdf version of the Wildsparq G.O.E model.
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Justin Harris is the COO of Wildsparq leader development and FireSeeds recruiting, located in Birmingham, AL. He is committed to helping companies and organizations enhance culture and multiply leaders. You can contact Justin directly at justin@fireseeds.com.