3 Steps to Better Cascade Corporate Strategy

How to Better Cascade Corporate Strategy
In nature, a cascade is a small, steep waterfall that flows in a descending manner from the top to the bottom, from high to low. In business we use the verb “cascading” when we talk about communicating and embedding a corporate strategy throughout the organization — often after a successful strategy retreat.

Effective Strategy Cascading Creates Alignment, Accountability, and Meaning
This communication and implementation process occurs in a series of reactions in which one causes another — in which every division, department, and individual is aligned around the overall strategic plan and the important part they play in making it a success. One move flows into another — but not always in a top-down direction.

Strategic Clarity Starts at the Top
Our organizational alignment research found strategic clarity accounts for 31% of the difference between high and low performing companies in terms of revenue growth, profitability, customer loyalty, employee engagement, and leadership effectiveness.

Once your business strategy has been fully understood and committed to as a leadership team, you should begin the hard work of strategy cascading and strategy execution. At a minimum, you need to be satisfied that the initial strategy you’ve crafted is clear enough and aligned enough across six areas to begin to get feedback from those responsible for implementing it:

• Strategic Drivers
  Mission (fundamental purpose), Vision (what you hope to become) and Values (core beliefs)
• Target Clients
  The ideal target clients who you serve best and where you should consistently win 75%+ of the time
• Differentiation
  The unique value proposition that truly sets you apart from the competition in the eyes of your target clients
• Optimizing Strategies
  The top 2 to 4 strategic priorities or big strategic choices for gaining the most strategic leverage
• Key Goals
  The critical few goals and accountabilities to achieve those optimizing strategies in the next twelve months
• Strategy Success Metrics
  How you will measure success and failure

3 Steps to Better Cascade Your Corporate Strategy
Leading-edge companies do not limit strategy discussions to the executive team.  They actively seek differing perspectives from key stakeholders to create buy-in, improve implementation, and build enthusiasm.  The goal of cascading the strategic plan is to ensure that it can be understood, committed to, and successfully executed across the organization.  Here are three tips on how to better cascade your corporate strategy from the board room to those employees whose day-to-day work will be informed by that strategy.

1. Don’t Assume Top-down “Telling” is the Way to Go
   While the executive leadership team is responsible for setting the overall direction, don’t make the mistake of telling everyone WHAT to do and HOW to do it.  That approach typically only works during a time of crisis or in highly structured, formal, and hierarchical organizations.

   In flatter and more nimble organizations, you need the active involvement, input, and buy-in from all key stakeholders for the overall strategy to be consistently executed and adjusted across the company.  Inviting front-line stakeholders to actively challenge, reframe, and improve the strategy greatly improves the chances for buy-in and successful strategy execution.

   Recent research by Bain found that the active engagement of stakeholders during the strategy design phase has the highest correlation to strategies being successfully implemented. Our organizational culture assessment data agrees — the more you open up the strategic discussion, the more enthusiasm, support, and agility you will find by those responsible for implementing it.

   Be open to feedback and honest about the parts of the strategy that are mandated, guided, or autonomous at the overall, department, team, and individual levels so people know where they are empowered to challenge assumptions and make it their own.

2. Execute from the Bottom-up
   Though you may initially build your strategy (the “What” and “Why”) in a small group of cross-functional leaders, it is often best to execute a strategy (the “How”) from the bottom up.  Leaders should give managers the opportunity and authority to challenge the strategic assumptions and to develop meaningful and relevant goals along the way as long as they align with the overall priorities of the business.  Managers should include their team members in figuring out how to best implement the strategy as internal and market realities shift.

   Each department can take the strategy and decide how to align and accomplish it in their own unique ways.  As a rule of thumb, be prepared to spend twice as much time cascading your strategy for each level away from the executive team.  For example, if you spent one month prepping and two days creating your corporate strategy with your executive team, be prepared to spend two months prepping and four days with your direct reports to get the required level of alignment, conviction, and commitment.

3. Monitor and Measure Progress for Accountability
   To be certain that you are moving in the right direction and that employees and their managers are implementing the strategy as planned, establish a system of regular and transparent metrics against goals for increased accountability.

   Establish consequences for poor work performance, adjust goals as necessary, celebrate progress, and reward success. A cadence of accountability is required to hold everyone accountable for delivery against the plan.

The Bottom Line
Well executed strategies start with strategic clarity at the top and are supported by heavily investing in cascading strategies, goals, metrics and accountability across the company. Your strategy must go through your people and your workplace culture to get fully implemented — so invest the time it takes to cascade plans effectively.

To learn if you are ready to cascade corporate strategy across your organization, download The Top 7 Ways to Stress Test Your Strategic Clarity