strategic literacy

Introducing Strategic LiteracySM

A Breakthrough Approach from Tailwind

Connecting People to Strategy

Why focus on Strategic Literacy?

73% of workers say their organization’s strategies and goals are

not translated into specific tasks they can execute.

70% of workers do not know what to do to support their organization’s

strategy.

81% of workers do not feel committed to their organization’s strategy.

87% of workers are not satisfied with the results of their work.

Excellence in Execution remains the number one issue cited by

CEO’s Worldwide.

“…a staggering 95% of employees in a company are either unaware of,

or do not understand the strategy.” Kaplan and Norton

Defining Strategic Literacy

What is Strategic Literacy for organizations or business?

As an outcome or result, it’s how well your people understand

your overall direction and collaborate to align their thinking and

their work with it.

As a process or approach, it’s the things that your organization

does to set a direction that is clear and focused, then get your

people to buy into that direction and know what they each

personally must do to make it happen.

As a mindset, it’s the strategic leader’s integrated approach to

communicating the overall direction and engaging their people.

As a business topic, it is a new field that lies between an

organization’s strategy and its execution by its people.

© Tailwind Consulting—All Rights Reserved

Most people are not literate in their own strategy

you Strategically Literate?

Strategic LiteracyTailwind focuses on aligning your people, and

their work, with your strategy

Symptoms of Gaps inOrganizational Literacy

How do you know when you have a problem with Strategic Literacy?

Senior Leaders

Executives

Managers

Supervisors

Employees

Strategy not clear and focused

Strategy not easily understood

Executives not collaborating on

execution

Strategy not translated at the Individual level

Lack of Strategic Thinking skills by

Executives

Everyone not on the same page

Employees do not understand the

strategy

Employees not committed to the

strategy

Too many initiatives & they’re not

aligned with the strategy

Organization not aligned around its

strategic intent

Aligning Executives and ManagersAlignment is a term that can represent wide variability in actual results. Organizations can be aligned around Mission and Values, but not long term Strategy. Or aligned around a Shared Vision, but not in the Strategic Imperatives they need to realize that Vision. Often executives and managers might agree on the “What”, but not on the “How.”

True alignment involves having a Shared Vision, then using a consistent Thinking Framework to translate that Vision into real work. True alignment involves precision of thought—where executives and managers at all levels collaborate around a central intent.

Tailwind’s process is built around true alignment and precise thinking. It aligns the thinking—and the work—of each executive and manager with the overall strategy, and with each other.

A New Process for Strategic PerformanceSenior Leaders often struggle with getting everyone on the same page so that they are engaged and fully aligned. Enabling your team to collaborate around a single strategy involves a lot of moving parts.

Strategic Performance is what happens between your intent—what you want to do—and its execution by your people. Without a managed translation process, an organization’s intent is often diluted as executives and managers interpret their individual roles in execution.

This dilution occurs because the strategic thinking of individual leaders often has a high degree of variability, or randomness. This randomness in the thinking process causes leaders to think differently about the urgency or relevance of problems they face. The predictable result is unfocused, ineffective execution of those things that are most strategically vital to the organization.

Assessing Your Organization’s Strategic Literacy

How Strategically Literate is your organization?

Sample Strategic Literacy Questions

1. Our strategy is clear and focused

2. Our people fully understand our direction

3. Our executives totally support the strategy

4. Our people know their roles in executing the strategy

5. Our strategy has been translated for each person

6. Each person’s work perfectly aligns with the strategy

7. We collaborate well in executing the strategy

8. Our initiatives are perfectly aligned with the strategy

9. Our people are fully engaged in executing the strategy

10. Our people are fully committed to our strategy

11. Our organization is fully aligned around the strategy


Strategy is Clear, Focused, and Articulated

Strategy is Translated across the Leadership Ranks

Strategy is Cascaded down and Translated through all levels of Leadership

Strategy is Cascaded into Work Teams and the work of each employee is aligned with it

Strategy has a regular ongoing focus across the organization

Progression of Strategic Literacy

We have developed solutions for all phases of helping an organization’s people become literate in their overall strategy…


Translating Strategy at the Individual LevelAn organization’s strategy is often difficult to understand. Even if your executives and managers do understand the strategy, they are challenged to effectively translate it for themselves and their part of the organization.

The ability to translate strategy at the individual level is like having a Rosetta Stone for your organization. The strategy suddenly makes sense—whether the language being spoken is Operations, IT, HR, Sales, or Marketing—everyone is able to plug-in to the big picture and make the right decisions.

Tailwind’s process enables each executive and manager to translate the overall strategy and own that translation. The priorities that they set are perfectly aligned with the overall direction. This makes them perfect agents for the overall intent and aligns both their thinking, and their work with the strategy.

Getting Everybody on the Same Page

Any good coach has a game plan. And any good player not only knows the overall game plan, but the exact plays that they need to execute. We often find that many organizations are pursuing success without a clear game plan. And their players—the executives and managers—aren’t necessarily running the right plays to win.

Tailwind changes the game by introducing the concept of Strategic GamePlanning©--the art of getting everyone on the same page. We have tested and proven an precise thinking framework that enables executives and managers at all levels to individually translate the overall game plan into the specific plays that they need to run. Our process focuses on building individual GamePlans for everyone, ensuring that each player is on the same page with the coach.

Six Innovations that enable Strategic Literacy

Strategic LiteracySM

Articulation Process

Individual Translation

Thinking as a Process

Focus on Real Work

Integrated Communication

Collaborative Engagement of

the Mind

There are a number of independent barriers that prevent organizations from improving their Strategic Literacy. Tailwind has developed a process that integrates six distinct innovations into a breakthrough approach.



As many as 95% of workers do not understand their organization’s strategy. We often find that the strategy is not as clear and focused as it needs to be.

How the strategy is structured and articulated makes all the difference. A clear and compelling strategy focuses the entire organization. Without the proper articulation process, a great strategy can falter in execution.

Tailwind helps organizations articulate their strategy to ensure that it is understood by everyone. We also work with executives and managers to articulate their own individual translation of the overall strategy so that it can be executed.





Focus on Real Work



the Mind

Individual Translation73% of workers say that their organization’s strategy is not translated into specific tasks that they can execute. Workers at all levels must translate strategy in order to make decisions and conduct business. Individually translating your strategy is the key to aligning these decisions and tasks with your overall intent.

Tailwind has developed a breakthrough process that enables executives and managers to create individual GamePlans that are perfectly aligned with the overall strategy. Our Strategic Partners at The Work Itself Group have developed a breakthrough process for aligning work teams with the overall strategy and translating the strategy into the tasks of each individual worker.

Working together, we can align the work of every worker with the overall strategy through individual translation.





Focus on Real Work



the Mind


Executives and Managers often lack a consistent process for translating strategy. This leads to variability in execution. And it is compounded by the fact that they are also inexperienced at strategic thinking.

Knowing this, organizational leaders work to align everyone’s behaviors. But in reality, an individual’s thinking precedes their behavior. If you want to effectively change behavior, the best place to start is with thinking. Tailwind’s approach focuses on managing each individual’s thinking process as the key to realizing desired behaviors.

Tailwind has created a set of proven thinking frameworks that get everyone on the same page to drive execution.





Focus on Real Work



the Mind

Focus on Real WorkWe focus on real work first, and learning occurs as a by product, not the other way around.

There’s a lot of buzz about “action learning”—having people learn something new while working in a simulated environment—so that the learning can then be effectively transferred back on the job. In fact, that’s the challenge with most new things: first learning them, and then attempting to transfer them to a real situation.

Tailwind’s approach is different. It applies directly to your own real work. We immediately engage your people in working on what really matters to your organization—the execution of your strategy. Our clients are both pleased and surprised by our approach because of the amount of real work that we accomplish from the very beginning.





Focus on Real Work



the Mind


Communicating strategy goes well beyond sharing it with employees. It includes how the strategy is structured so that it can be easily understood. It involves how the senior executives are included so that they can buy into the strategy. It factors in how each person is presented with the opportunity and tools needed to align their individual work with the strategy. It considers how each person understands their individual role in executing the strategy.

At Tailwind, our entire process is designed around an integrated communication process. Our overall goal is to make your people fully literate in your strategy and we weave elements of communication into every step of our approach. The result is that your people will deeply understand your strategy and be able to align their work in support of it.





Focus on Real Work



the Mind

Collaborative Engagement of the Mind“Managers can’t align people with strategy…people must align themselves.”*

People align themselves when they are mentally engaged with the strategy and have a structured process for collaborating in its execution. That is, they have the opportunity to understand the big picture and paint themselves into it.

Tailwind uses a consistent thinking process that enables everyone to align around a common strategy. It engages individuals in thinking through the strategy from their perspective. It provides them with the opportunity to be self-determinant in what they need to do in order to execute it.

When people are empowered to collaboratively engage in thinking about the strategy, they own the outcomes. The priorities they set and the decisions they make are aligned with the strategy. They recognize and value collaboration as a key to accomplishing their own work.





Focus on Real Work



the Mind

* Dr. Brent Peterson and Gaylan Nielson, Fake Work

An Innovative New Approach

Connecting People to Strategy is achieved by making the organization strategically literate in its own strategy. Tailwind’s approach leverages six innovative design principles that enable its effectiveness.

Strategic literacy galvanizes an organization’s people around its strategic intent. It enables them to understand their role and how they fit into the big picture. It provides a consistent framework for translating the overall strategy individually at their level.

Strategic Literacy is a new way of thinking around how to deploy and execute strategy. It broadens the possibilities for how leaders can engage and align their organizations by changing the collective mindset—one person at a time.





Focus on Real Work



the Mind

Connecting People to Strategy


Contact Tailwind:[email protected]

(813) 903-9509

mailto:[email protected]

strategic literacy

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