We all know people, organizations or companies who speak/communicate a lot but in return do/implement quite less. Sometimes this is because of missing willingness, motivation, purpose. But it can very well be because of missing capability and competence of execution. The fact of today is that execution is one of the main differentiators between a company and its competitors.

Contrariwise to perceived, execution is not only about operational or administrative part of the work which leaders can delegate. It's rather the discipline and system in an organization on how things are getting done.

In their book EXECUTION Larry Bossidy & Ram Charan explain intensively the importance of execution discipline linking it to the different processes of an organization and also give strong insights from real cases that can reveal the potential of making strategies work and be successful.

When companies are not successful, we always tend to think that they don't have the right strategies. However most of the time the issue is turning the theory into practice and this is what execution capability is for. It's the discipline to get things done. It's the system the organization should have to know how to do and what to do to make sure strategy lands. Execution is (and should be) the fundamental responsibility of the leader and the essential piece of the organizational culture. This should not be mixed with micromanagement, the role of the leader is to create and drive a culture where people do and look always for the best to take the actions and keep it running.

The authors base execution on three main building blocks:

• Seven fundamental behaviors of the leader: These behaviors help the leader to be a good executer and keeps away from being a micromanager.

# Know your company and your employees

# Be persistent on realism

# Define clear targets and priorities

# Follow up

# Recognize and reward success

# Develop the talents of your people

# Know yourself

• Definition of the frame for the cultural change: When things go wrong, leaders look for a cultural change. When doing this they should acknowledge the importance of "soft" part of the culture such as the beliefs/values/behaviors of the people in the same level as the "hard" part of the culture like organizational model/tools/systems etc.
• Placement of right people in the right jobs: Employees are the most valuable assets of the companies. Selecting the right people and placing them in the right jobs create a strong and sustainable competitive advantage.

The last part of the book deep dives into the "how" of execution. Three main processes are associated with the execution discipline.

• People process (linking with strategy and operations): This is the most important among all, for sure for a reason; without right people we cannot talk about any execution. In this process the expectation (or target) is evaluating people accurate and detailed, defining and developing the leadership competences that the organization need in all levels and forms, building a strong and sustainable succession plan.
• Strategy process (linking with people and operations): The essence of this process is preventing strategy to be just a fancy presentation on the top of the headquarter tower and bring it to/give a life at the shop floor. The strategy needs to fit to organization's people and also to the operations that the company is in. Otherwise it's almost impossible to take even a baby step from dreams towards results. Strategy should be an iterative process; this means it should be evaluated transparently and constructively, and then should be adjusted/updated when and where needed.
• Operation process (linking with people and strategy): When the organization has the right strategy and right people in place, then the operation is expected to follow the action plans, adjust day2day activities and own the tangible outcomes to get closer to the high level/long term targets. This process could be the most hands on piece of the execution system.

Execution appears to be still the most underestimated, overlooked, deprioritized muscle of an organization compared to the focus and attention given to the creation of a strategy. However in an environment where STRATEGY🔗PEOPLE🔗OPERATION are not strongly & directly & simultaneously linked to each other, it would be quite optimistic to expect a real and sustainable success. A culture where leaders only write the script and expect others to spontaneously play is definitely far away from the execution discipline that is the key to achieve & exceed strategical targets.