Does your Organization have Too Many Priorities?

Talk to any senior leader or employee and they will complain about their organization having too many strategic initiatives, too many projects, and too many priorities.

The entire organization is stressed out and everybody is feeling overwhelmed.

Leaders complain that there is no significant progress on any of the projects.

Employees complain about being stretched too thin across dozens of projects, which usually come on top of their “real” job.

Everybody complains about not having the necessary resources to move forward.

The root cause for all these projects is the fear of missing out on something and losing your competitive edge if you don’t implement them all. Everything is sooooo important!

Ironically, you‘re achieving exactly the opposite: Your organization is stuck because of too many projects. It‘s not making any significant progress on any of the projects. Let alone achieve any impact on what really matters to move the needle.

So, how to get unstuck?

As cheesy as it may sound, you need a clear strategy.

I‘m not talking about a sophisticated, long power point document with lots of market analysis, competitor analysis, data analysis, etc.

What I‘m talking about is a clear, challenge-based strategy.

Here are three steps to take:

1. First, outline what your ambitions are. What are you trying to achieve? It could be growth; it could be becoming more customer-centric; it could be making progress on your digital transformation. Whatever. But focus on a maximum of 3 specific, tangible ambitions.
2. Second, identify what is keeping you from achieving those ambitions. What are the big, most pressing challenges? What’s making this difficult? What‘s keeping you from making progress?
3. Third, review all your projects and initiatives. Stop anything that doesn‘t contribute to your ambitions. Focus on the ones that do. Be clear about how a certain project will contribute to overcoming your challenges and achieving your ambitions. If that‘s not clear, stop it. Or change it significantly.