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7 Know How to Get Things Done:

Hit the Brakes on the Ideas; Hit the Gas on the Execution

Have you ever come out of a brainstorming meeting all pumped up about all the great ideas, only to realize later that none of them came to fruition?

Most companies have no shortage of great ideas, and great ideas are important. Innovation is valuable. It keeps us sharp and competitive. Besides, it’s easy and fun to get excited about big ideas. What’s not quite so sexy is executing them. And so, too often, these companies just don’t.

A tendency to fall short on execution creates serious challenges for a company. In a business world that gets more complex and moves faster every day, being able to execute quickly and efficiently is a survival skill. Competitors are everywhere and customers have extremely high expectations. The organizations that perform well in this high-pressure environment are those whose leaders have a bias toward execution. It’s not that they discourage innovative thinking. It’s that they know how to put boundaries around it and operationalize it.

When big ideas are flowing fast and furious, trying to process them all is like drinking from a fire hose. People get so overwhelmed that they can’t take in everything and they can’t move ahead on anything. (This is especially true in small companies, where everyone is so busy just running the day-to-day business that there’s little time for anything else.) They end up going a mile wide and an inch deep on things instead of picking a few items and doing them really well.

My experience has been that the organization that can take one or two ideas and relentlessly work to bring them to fruition will be far more successful than the group with a million great ideas.

This can be confusing to employees. Naturally everyone believes their boss wants to hear great ideas. I just heard an interesting story about a new chief marketing officer who was having trouble with the CEO. At the heart of the matter was all her great ideas (believe it or not). What the CEO really wanted was someone who could execute the basics the former CMO wasn’t able to get done (like creating a new website).

Ideas matter, but execution matters more. I always tell companies to hit the brakes on the ideas and hit the gas on execution. This doesn’t mean giving up on big ideas altogether. It means being more thoughtful about which ones you pursue, then giving the vast majority of your focus to executing on them. A few tips that may be helpful:

 Benchmark others. If someone has already solved the problem there’s no need to reinvent the wheel. Some years ago, I read an article in the Harvard Business Review entitled “Imitation is More Valuable Than Innovation.” Author Oded Shenkar pointed out that almost 98 percent of the value of innovations actually goes to those who imitate them.1 Don’t think you have to be first to market. You can save valuable time and resources just by making it a habit to learn from others.

 Train yourself to notice and seize opportunities. Successful leaders are good at spotting opportunities and acting on them. Often when we think of seizing opportunity we tend to envision big-picture, game-changing kinds of events. We end up overlooking the smaller, everyday chances to make something better. (Quite often, the most valuable opportunities present themselves as problems.) You might think that these little things don’t make a difference, but the cumulative effect of a lot of little things has a huge impact over time, not to mention these smaller things are often much easier to execute and maximize.

 Seek consent, not consensus. When seeking to act on a new opportunity, we usually need to move quickly and efficiently. This means that, quite often, we don’t have time to change everyone’s mind before we act. We can’t seek consensus in our decision making. We must seek consent instead. While it’s good (and necessary) to collect input from people inside the organization, when we try to please everyone, we just get mired down and nothing happens.

 There will always be resistance. However, when you consistently treat people with respect, transparency, fairness, and gratitude, you increase the likelihood that they’ll accept your decision—even if they personally disagree with it.

 Pick a few big ideas that you want to pursue. Begin with two or three only. No company can focus on too many things at once. You want a maximum amount of brainpower and energy directed at a few, very crucial projects, rather than having it divided up thinly among too many.

 Think carefully about sequencing. Which big idea should come first? Often there is a good reason to put Idea 1 ahead of Idea 2. Think it through before you set the project in motion. (However, don’t fall victim to analysis paralysis or wait for conditions to be perfect. At some point you just have to pull into traffic.)

 Do the same kind of thinking after you’ve selected a project and are ready to get started. Like building a house, executing an idea requires that you do things in the right order. Try to do too many things at once (or in an order that doesn’t make sense) and the project gets too complicated and stalls out.

 Think about the organization’s priorities and the timing. A good idea at the wrong time can turn into a bad one quickly.

 Build in some small wins to get momentum going. Start with an easy target goal that helps you make progress on your first big idea. This builds up people’s confidence and enthusiasm. Small wins lead to bigger wins, which lead to even bigger wins.

 Know who your drivers are. There are some people who just know how to get things done. You probably know right away who these people are inside your company. Make sure they are leading the projects.

 Tie performance reviews to getting things done. Rewarding and recognizing outcomes (not just raw ideas) sends the message that execution matters more than a lot of talk about what “could” be. Set clear, objective, measurable goals for the project leaders and weight them in a way that clearly shows that execution is a top priority. When people know they will be graded (and compensated) on something, they are far more likely to do it than if they are given some vague, open-ended assignment.

 Hold regular meetings to ensure that progress is being made. These “check-ins” not only reassure you that your big ideas are being executed, they keep project leaders focused and motivated. They force people to show progress. Plus, they give you a chance to course-correct early if it turns out something isn’t working like you thought it would.

 Don’t get hung up on perfection. Trying to get things perfect slows down and, in some cases, prevents execution. It causes people to miss deadlines and to spend too much time trying to polish up a project when they really should be moving on to the next one. I have always found that most of the time 90 percent is good enough. It’s when you’re obsessed with getting to 100 percent that your momentum slows and you may even stall out.

 Celebrate milestones along the way. Spotlighting progress helps build momentum, and enjoying regular success is important for creating meaningful work and keeping employees engaged and satisfied.

Having a process in place to help people execute ideas is crucial. When your company has a lot of big ideas that don’t get off the ground, people get cynical. They don’t believe anything is really going to change. This kind of cynicism can really drag down the culture.

On the other hand, when you have a big win, people gain confidence. They get excited about the next idea. They get motivated to bring it to life. This energy and enthusiasm become part of your culture, and, before you know it, a focus on execution is part of your company’s DNA. This is when things really take off—and you’re well on your way to being a perpetually high-performing organization.

Note

1 1 Oded Shenkar, “Defend Your Research: Imitation Is More Valuable Than Innovation,” Harvard Business Review, April 2010, https://hbr .org/2010/04/defend-your-research-imitation-is-more-valuable-than -innovation.