Co-Creating Strategy for Significant Buy-In
The Challenge:
With mounting pressures inside and outside the company, it was a critical time for a major manufacturer of consumer goods and its global supply chain function. All eyes were on the new head of the function and their leadership team to turnaround the company and lead a transformation with a new strategy.
The Solution:
We partnered with the leadership team to take a different approach to shaping and activating the strategy, which would define not only the next three years but the next generation of the organization.
OUT went the typical routine of the new strategy being defined solely by top leaders and a management consulting firm with binders full of research and PowerPoints. It wasn’t working in part because the strategy didn’t have the full commitment of leaders in the function and across the business.
IN came an open, collaborative, iterative approach to co-create the strategy with the top few hundred leaders of the function through a “strategy sprint” approach.
Our approach was to go deeper into the business to engage the top leaders and their direct reports as well as regional leadership for perspective around the ambition they’re aiming for, the root cause problems that need to be solved, and the pathway to get there.
We did this through a series of online and in-person collaboration events. Along each critical phase of the strategy building process, leaders would have a set of stimuli to prompt their thinking before providing input. Their feedback along each step of the journey helped shape the final strategy. Thus, when it came time unveil their strategy, those involved in its development saw their fingerprints all over it.
In all, the top 150 leaders shared 500 ideas that fueled the strategy and gave a voice to leaders who despite being closest to customers and teams, were traditionally NOT brought into the strategy development process. We then rolled out the strategy at a key meeting for leaders to get immersed in the path forward.
Key Results:
- 90% believed there was substantial input gathered in developing the strategy
- 99% understood the strategy and path forward
- 90% had confidence in the future of the company
When asked how they felt, leaders shared that part of the reason they had so much trust in the leadership team and optimism that this strategy would work is because they were: “part of the process.”