文档介绍：60 Harvard Business Review | June 2008 |
The Secrets to essful
STRATEGY
EXECUTION
Research shows that enterprises fail at execution because they go straight
to structural anization and neglect the most powerful drivers
of effectiveness – decision rights and information fl ow.
by Gary L. Neilson, Karla L. Martin, and Elizabeth Powers
A BRILLIANT STRATEGY, blockbuster product, or breakthrough
technology can put you on petitive map, but only
solid execution can keep you there. You have to be able to
deliver on your intent. Unfortunately, the majority pa-
nies aren’t very good at it, by their own admission. Over the
past fi ve years, we have invited many thousands of employees
(about 25% of whom came from executive ranks) plete
an online assessment of anizations’ capabilities, a pro-
cess that’s generated a database of 125,000 profi les representing
more than 1,panies, government agencies, and not-for-
profi ts in over 50 countries. Employees at three out of every fi ve
Jacob Thomas Jacob
A | June 2008 | Harvard Business Review 61
The Secrets to essful Strategy Execution
companies rated anization weak at execution – that This time, management looked beyond lines and boxes to
is, when asked if they agreed with the statement “Important the mechanics of how work got done. Instead of searching
strategic and operational decisions are quickly translated into for ways to strip out costs, they focused on improving execu-
action,” the majority answered no. tion – and in the process discovered the true reasons for the
Execution is the result of thousands of decisions made ev- performance shortfall. Managers didn’t have a clear sense of
ery day by employees acting according to the information their respective roles and responsibilities. They did not intui-
they have and their own self-interest. In our work helping tively understand which decisions were theirs to make. More-
more than panies learn to execute more effectivel