These four ideas will move your staff members into action

The end of the year is just around the corner, once again far too quickly and companies in Singapore are gearing up for the new year. There is a general feel that after five tough years that the next two years will see us turning up and from 2015 the markets in many industries will be more buoyant.

Leaders are conducting offsites in hotels around the island. A pharmaceutical firm just met to review the 2013 strategies and measures. A beauty firm just reviewed next year’s plans and one of the banks just revisited 2013’s scorecard.

The luxury of hosting these meetings overseas has been curtailed because of the current pressures. These offsites are typically two-days and provide the platform and opportunity for leaders to step back from the day-to-day challenges and consider where the company’s competitive edge is going to be, going forward.

Unfortunately despite excellent discussions, many offsites fail to have the desired and expected impact once the leaders return to the business. This is a predicament we can no longer afford.

Leaders must return from the offsites and make a difference. They can’t afford not to. They must have quality discussions that identify where the opportunities are and how they’ll leverage them. Then they must return to the organization and make a difference by leading the implementation of the agreed actions.

Leaders don’t implement the actions themselves. They are responsible for overseeing them.

When Gandhi said, “You must be the change” he was not talking about strategy implementation.

In implementation, leaders supervise. They are responsible for engaging the people and supporting them but not for being the implementation. They must show people what needs to be done, how it can be implemented and why it is critical to the organization’s success. Most leaders fail to do this.

Leaders are responsible for effectively explaining what needs to be done and for also supporting their staff members through the implementation.

In Bridges Business Consultancy Int, the company I work for, we have just completed our Singapore and other 2012 implementation survey and we are just about to publish the results. From the research and our clients’ experience we have been able to identify the critical four “Supporting Mechanisms” that leaders must adopt to ensure their staff members take the right actions.

All four are critical for success. They are common sense but we have found that just because they are common sense, they are not common practice.

The four critical Supporting Mechanisms leaders must adopt to ensure staff members take the right actions are:

Accountability

Individuals must be held accountable for their actions. They must know that their immediate boss is going to check on their performance and track it. They must know that there will be consequences for not taking the actions.

Reviews

Must be conducted weekly to ensure the actions are being taken and are creating the right outcomes. By checking weekly in short 20 minute meetings you achieve the accountability but also keep the implementation front and centre.

Support

Individuals’ actions must be supported by reinforcing positive behaviors and punishing negative behaviors. Positive reinforcement encourages behaviors where as negative reinforcement stops behaviors. Individuals must be encouraged and motivated to take the right actions.

Strategy Alignment

There must be a clear line of sight of the actions being taken to the strategy. Individuals are motivated inside organizations by being part of something greater than themselves. When they see their own actions contributing to the larger strategy they understand the impact but more importantly are motivated to keep taking the right actions.