Business execution tools & frameworks

Kotter's 8-Step Change Model

by: Scott E McGlon
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​In today's fast-paced and competitive business landscape, successful execution hinges on effective strategic planning and implementation. To navigate this complex environment, organizations rely on a myriad of business tools and frameworks. This comprehensive guide explores the utilization of essential tools such as OKRs, KPIs, Balanced Scorecard, Ansoff Matrix, BCG Matrix, and the Blue Ocean Strategy to generate, evaluate, and execute strategic options. Additionally, we dive into communication plans, implementation management, and post-implementation evaluation strategies. All three sections are critical to define, and ultimately achieve, optimal results.  Whether you are a startup or an established company, these tools and techniques are invaluable for achieving your strategic objectives.

In each section below, we have provided, what we think, is the most appropriate and thorough link for each business tool and frameworks.  This will give you the ability to dive into each business tool outlined to get a clear perspective on how they can impact your business in the most optimal way. 

Section 1: Setting the Strategic Foundation

1.1 Objectives and Key Results (OKRs)
OKRs provide a goal-setting framework that aligns everyone in the organization with the company's strategic objectives. They consist of clear, measurable objectives and key results that measure progress toward those objectives. OKRs help organizations define their priorities, track performance, and foster accountability.

1.2 Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)
KPIs are quantifiable metrics that measure the success of various aspects of a business. They serve as crucial benchmarks for tracking progress, identifying areas for improvement, and ensuring that strategic goals are met. Choosing the right KPIs is essential for effective performance management.

1.3 Balanced Scorecard
The Balanced Scorecard is a comprehensive framework that translates an organization's mission and strategy into a set of performance measurements. It helps businesses balance financial and non-financial indicators, providing a holistic view of performance across four perspectives: financial, customer, internal processes, and learning and growth. 

Section 2: Generating Strategic Options

2.1 Ansoff Matrix
The Ansoff Matrix is a tool that assists in exploring growth strategies. It presents four growth options: market penetration, market development, product development, and diversification. By analyzing these options, businesses can identify the most suitable growth strategy for their current situation.

2.2 Boston Consulting Group Matrix (BCG Matrix)
The BCG Matrix categorizes a company's products or business units into four quadrants: stars, question marks, cash cows, and dogs. This matrix helps organizations allocate resources effectively by focusing on products or units with the highest growth potential and market share.

2.3 Blue Ocean Strategy
The Blue Ocean Strategy challenges traditional competition-based strategies by encouraging businesses to create uncontested market spaces (blue oceans) rather than competing in saturated markets (red oceans). It involves innovation and value creation to make competition irrelevant.

Section 3: Implementation and Communication

3.1 Establishing a Strong Communication Plan
Effective communication is essential during strategy implementation. Tools like Gantt Charts, RACI Matrices, and Kanban Boards help teams communicate tasks, responsibilities, timelines, and progress effectively.

• Gantt Chart: A visual timeline that displays project tasks and their dependencies, helping teams plan and monitor progress.
• RACI Matrix: Clarifies roles and responsibilities by categorizing individuals as Responsible, Accountable, Consulted, or Informed for each task or decision.
• Kanban Board: A visual project management tool that helps teams visualize workflow and track tasks in real-time.

Section 4: Evaluating Results and Outcomes

4.1 Strategic Planning Framework for Evaluation
Evaluating the results and outcomes of strategy implementation is critical for continuous improvement. Use tools like dashboards, scorecards, and After-Action Reviews (AARs) to assess performance and gather insights.

• Dashboards: Visual representations of key performance metrics that provide at-a-glance insights into the status of strategic initiatives.
• Scorecards: A structured framework for tracking and measuring performance against predefined targets and KPIs. You will also find "Balanced Scorecards" which are usually broken down in four dimensions: Learning and Growth, Business Process, Customer, and Financial. Each scorecard dimension affects and is affected by the others, meaning that changes to the measurements can have a significant impact and must be carefully managed.
• After Action Review (AAR): Originally developed by the miltiary, an ARR is a structured debriefing process that examines what worked, what didn't, and why, helping organizations learn from their experiences.

Section 5: Additional Strategies for Startups and Established Companies

For startups:

• SWOT Analysis: Analyze strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats to make informed strategic decisions.  Thoroughly knowing each sets any business analysis up to succeed knowing what's in front of you.  
• Lean Startup Methodology: Focus on building a minimum viable product (MVP) and iterating based on customer feedback. “Startup success can be engineered by following the process, which means it can be learned, which means it can be taught.” - Eric Ries
• Customer Development: Engage with customers to validate product-market fit and refine your business model. Thorough customer development is a framework that is used to determine whether or not a product fulfills a need or needs of the customer. It is part of the lean startup concept which is composed of business model design, customer development, and agile engineering. Customer development succeeds in the business model design stage and assumes that the model has untested inferences contained within it. The process of customer development then validates the inferences, voids them, or identifies a need to modify them. The framework, if used correctly, should result in a final product that solves a real-world problem for the consumer, is viable to produce and scale, and strikes the right price point for all stakeholders.

For established companies:

• Benchmarking: Compare your performance against industry leaders to identify areas for improvement.  Benchmarking lets you know where you stand and how you match up with the industry you are in and the competitors you are up against.  There are four types of benchmarking:
  • Practice benchmarking (qualitative)- involves gathering and comparing qualitative information about how an activity is conducted through people, processes, and technology.  For practice benchmarking, you will need a standard approach to gather and compare qualitative information such as process mapping. The end results will be insight into where and how performance gaps occur and best practices that your organization can apply to other areas with the company.
  • Performance benchmarking (quantitative)- involves gathering and comparing quantitative data from your key performance indicators. Performance benchmarking is usually the first step organizations take to identify performance gaps. You will need the results from your KPIs and an accountable means of extracting, collecting, and analyzing that data. The end results will be data that informs decision making. This form of benchmarking is usually the first step organizations take to identify gaps in  performance in key areas of their business. 
  • Internal benchmarking - compares metrics (performance benchmarking) and/or practices (practice benchmarking) from different units, product lines, departments, programs, geographies, etc., within the organization. What you need: At least two areas within the organization that have shared metrics and/or practices. Internal benchmarking is a good starting point to understanding your current standard of business performance. Sustained internal benchmarking applies mainly to large organizations where certain areas of the business are more efficient and productive than others.
  • External benchmarking - compares metrics and/or practices of one organization to one or many others. For optimized custom benchmarking, ideally you need more than one organization to participate.  It is also good to get a nondiscrimination third party to facilitate the data collection from all parties involved. This approach can be highly valuable but often requires significant time and effort. That’s why organizations engage with groups like American Productivity & Quality Center (APQC), which offers more than 3,000 ways to measure results so you can use it to compare performance to organizations worldwide and in nearly every industry.
• Change Management Frameworks: Utilize models like Kotter's 8-Step Change Model to facilitate organizational change smoothly. The 8-Step Change Model includes Creating Urgency, Forming a Powerful Coalition, Creating a Vision for Change, Communicating your Vision,  Removing all Obstacles, Creating Short-Term Wins, Building on the Change, and Anchoring the Changes in your Corporate Culture.
• Total Quality Management (TQM): By implementing TQM principles, you are committing to enhance product and/or service quality continuously throughout your organization. Total quality management is one of the most structured and well-known approaches to overall organizational management across the globe. The focus of the TQM process is to improve the quality of an organization's outputs, including goods and services, through the continual improvement of internal practices.

In conclusion, effective strategic planning, implementation, and evaluation are paramount for long-term success with any business. Leveraging a comprehensive toolkit of business tools such as OKRs, KPIs, Balanced Scorecard, Ansoff Matrix, BCG Matrix, and the Blue Ocean Strategy provides organizations with the means to navigate uncertainty, make informed decisions, and achieve strategic goals. By complementing these tools with robust communication plans and post-implementation evaluation strategies, businesses can adapt to changing landscapes, drive new innovations, and continuously improve their performance, regardless of their stage of development. What Peter Drucker said decades ago certainly applies for every business operating today:  What gets measured, gets managed!

About the Author:  Scott E McGlon is the President of McGlon Properties, LLC and the author of many blog post on MP Blog.  He has been a serial entrepreneur, investor, and president of many successful start-ups since 1998. 

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