Let me share a quick story about a married couple. Let’s call them Pam and Curt. Their days are filled with young children, demanding jobs and volunteer activities. More often than not, they wave to each other in passing as one returns from a kid’s art class and the other heads out to youth hockey practice.
One day, Pam and Curt remember they’re good friends—not just busy parents and professionals. They decide to take a vacation. Pam begins to envision the perfect trip: a fall journey up the Eastern Seaboard to admire the changing leaves. (Pam is an aspirational leafer.) She creates “Pam’s Fall Vacation Strategic Plan,” complete with dates, flights, train schedules, hotels, and restaurants.
Excited about the perfect plan she’s created, Pam calls Curt while she’s waiting for a cross-country race to start. She’s expecting a ringing endorsement of her leafing ambition. Curt responds with a different idea: “Let’s go to New York that weekend—the Rangers have a home game, and the Packers are in town!”
Suddenly, two strategic vacation plans emerge, and their priorities diverge: fall foliage versus sports. Can they align their different priorities? Should they even take the trip?
This fable illustrates a common theme we at DORIS see in organizational planning. Leaders invest significant effort crafting comprehensive strategies, convinced they’ll fuel their organization’s future. But once presented, the questions begin.“What does this mean for me?” “Why focus on these goals when today’s challenges are pressing?” Before leaders know it, that perfect plan is in a binder gathering dust on a shelf.
But it doesn’t have to be that way.
Here are a few practical tips for putting your plans into action:
◗ Think of the plan as the “what” and the implementation as the“how.”
◗ Agency matters. Teams and individuals should have freedom to adapt their approach so plans remain flexible for real-world circumstances.
◗ Once an approach is set, accountability tools are essential.Without them, old habits quickly return.
◗ Metrics are needed to measure the effectiveness of new approaches against the plan’s goals.
Now back to Pam and Curt …
Success means intentionally carving out time for each other, not just shuttling kids around. Their “what” is creating meaningful time together outside of their children’s activities.Their “how” is combining a Rangers game at Madison SquareGarden with a train ride that is a leafer’s dream. Accountability? Both book their piece of the trip, ensuring each person’s interests are honored. Measurement? On the flight back, they reflect on how well the trip balanced individual passions with their shared goal. If satisfied, they use this experience as a template for future vacations, tweaking strategy as needed.Rinse and repeat for each future trip.
For leaders, the lesson is clear: Real progress happens when people align on a leader’s vision and are given the agency to execute the vision in a multitude of ways. Leaders need to understand that their plans will be successful only when others know how—and more important, want—to engage with them. This means a leader needs to get comfortable with seeing their vision come to life through other people’s eyes. It won’t look exactly as they originally pictured, but it will actually happen—and that’s what’s important.
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