Forest and trees
THE bias for action is critical when dealing with consultants, especially those coming from academe or who have had many clients in one category. While these gurus can mesmerize a seminar crowd, or a board committee with their road map to the future (evolve or die), they seldom bother with how to move their clients from Point A to Point F. They may dismiss such humdrum exertions as operational issues.
Success goes beyond strategy. And the devil is in the details. The play is just a script until there is a cast and a working sound system, with the hundred details in between, including the catering for rehearsals.
People who describe themselves as “big picture” guys, who see the forest instead of the trees, tend to underestimate the importance of trees. Are they just details or are they what the forest is all about?
People who describe themselves as “big picture” guys, who see the forest instead of the trees, tend to underestimate the importance of trees. Are they just details or are they what the forest is all about?
A fancy but seldom patronized restaurant in a low-traffic location may essay a business goal expressed in grandiose terms: to be the lifestyle culinary experience of choice for the trend-setting, high-disposable income set of influencers among millennials.
This kind of sweeping mission statement calls for all sorts of details like where this demographic niche now presently dines or whether they even constitute a defined target market worth chasing. Do they have disposable income? Do they eat in a group? What kind of menu will they find attractive? What price points are acceptable? Who are the competitors in this category and how well are they doing? What kind of chef is needed in the kitchen and how much will she cost?
Operational details are like that. They tend to be tedious and almost irritating to the forest guy who feels he is being attacked by a swarm of hornets -- let the operational folks figure that out. What we need is a road map...but how do you get to the destination and what form of transport is appropriate? Also, who will drive? How much gas is needed?
The most elusive form of goal-setting is chasing ranking, like aiming to be number 1 in a category. This objective holds a few assumptions. It presumes one has defined the industry he belongs to and who his competitors are. In our restaurant example, does being first include only restaurants in that block. If so, how many blocks are involved? Does it involve restaurants in the category of choice, say only French bistro types?
The other problem of ranking as a goal involves defining the category to compete in, whether gross revenues, market share, or profitability. But the most pernicious implication of this type of goal setting is an almost automatic me-too strategy which becomes the default option. What the present number 1 goes into is slavishly copied and attempted to be exceeded by the challenger with sub-goals like cost is not an impediment in the objective. Poaching talent from Number 1 becomes compelling. Usually, the wannabe ends up with discards and overpay for them.
Game changers like Apple offered products like tablets and smartphones that consumers didn’t even think they wanted, or needed. Leadership in any industry sometimes means changing the rules and redefining the industry category. Can a phone be a computer or a camera? Does Apple belong to the computer industry or the phone sector? It doesn’t seem to matter anymore when categories converge.
The category that one’s business belongs to is not always obvious. Does a gym belong to the fitness business or health care? Defining one’s competition determines the core skills needed to excel. Anyway, in all these exercises, implementation rules. A piece of legislation, say on cyber crime, can be tied up in knots on what it means out there in the real world. It’s the implementing guidelines that make the law workable. Although sometimes ambiguity is an opportunity for side deals.
Even those who accept that the devil is in the details understand that it is still necessary to set goals. While “forest” visionaries tend to have bad accounting habits (it’s not a cost, but an investment) they are the ones who change the game, but not always how they intended to. The detailed “trees” people have to get involved. Sometimes, both types just get lost in the woods.