Customer Reviews

Preventing Strategic Gridlock: Leading Over, Under & Around Organizational Jams to Achieve High Performance Results

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Obviously, it is highly advisable to identify and then eliminate potential problems before they occur. That is as true in business as it is in healthcare, athletic competition, and international travel. What we have here is a solid, well-organized, and well-written guide to preventing strategic gridlock. First, Harper carefully examines seven of the usual suspects which can cause it. Next, she introduces what she calls U.N.L.O.C.K., a system based on six principles by which to avoid or eliminate them. Finally, she shifts her reader's attention to countless real-world examples.

Obviously, an inappropriate strategy almost invariably results in conflict, confusion, acrimony, perhaps operational gridlock, and worse yet, chaos. Moreover, Harper fully understands that even a fundamentally sound strategy can fail because of internal resistance by those whom Jim O'Toole describes as being captive to "the ideology of comfort and the tyranny of custom." Or that strategy can become less effective or even ineffective because of market forces over which the organization has little (if any) conrol. Harper has absolutely no illusions about the complexity of these and other issues. She could easily have identified 14 or even 21 "roadblocks." Her U.N.L.O.C.K. system could have been based on 10 or even 15 principles. That's not the point. Rather, when crafting a strategy, decision-makers in any organization (regardless of size or nature) should identify and then prepare for what they perceive to be the potentially most formidable roadblocks to that strategy's success. (FYI, my personal preference is to view strategies as "hammers" and tactics as "nails.") Everyone must understand and support the strategy. What amounts to an "early warning system" is needed and everyone at least directly involved with the strategy and its tactics must be especially alert during the strategy's initial implementation.

Although I encountered no "cutting edge thinking" in Harper's book, I hold it in high regard because it fully serves the needs of decision-makers who need (perhaps urgently) a cohesive, comprehensive, and cost-effective system by which to avoid or extricate their organizations from strategic gridlock. Another major benefit of having an "early warning system" is that if the strategy is a dud, that will soon be obvious and Harper's book can assist with whatever adjustments may be necessary.

Those who share my interest in how and why even major corporations such as Ford, Coca-Cola, and McDonald's make bad strategic decisions, I urge them to check out Matt Haig's recently published Bad Brands.

Preventing Strategic Gridlock

Have you ever found a gem of a book that you know you'll hold unto and use again and again? I found that book, Preventing Strategic Gridlock by Pamela S. Harper. The value of the book is twofold; the ideas and concepts about how to identify the root causes of seemingly mysterious organizational problems she calls "strategic gridlock," as well as a process to follow to break through the gridlock and accelerate progress toward high performance results - regardless of the economy.

The premise of Preventing Strategic Gridlock is just as relevant today as it was when the book was first published in 2002. We live in a changing world of work in which there are changes (external) that we do not have control over such as; economic fluctuations that impact business conditions, global technology evolutions, international globalization to name a few. Ms. Harper uses highly publicized cases to illustrate how in a turbulent business environment, even the most sophisticated organizations can inadvertently work against themselves despite everyone's best intentions. She states that the ability to align strategy with the organization's "reality," including its many overlooked and underestimated stakeholders inside and outside of the company, is critical to preventing excessive conflict, mysterious morale problems, persistent firefighting,, and other organizational dysfunctions that get in the way of companies achieving high performance results.

Ms. Harper uses her extensive experience consulting internally and externally to companies of all sizes in a variety of industries to guide readers on how to prevent problems from occurring in their own organizations. She outlines a process to identify what "type" of strategic gridlock may be occurring, whether it is an internally or externally driven gridlock, and a process plan to systematically validate the type of gridlock and a methodology for addressing the different types of gridlock.

In a business climate that is fraught with uncertainty and guarantees change, there is confidence in the predictable process for identifying categories of gridlock and methodologies for addressing the different types of challenges that leaders and their organizations face. This also gives the book universal appeal. - it is a process that can be applied and adapted to many cultures and industries.

Ms. Harper suggests we read through the book and then refer to section(s) that apply to our business challenge(s) followed by applying the process (es) prescribed for high performance success. Sounds like prudent advice to me!

I learned strategic planning from the usual textbooks and strategy consultants with established brand names. That was the easy part. Pamela S. Harper's book is not about any of that. It's about what it takes to develop strategies that have the best chance of succeeding during implementation. These are insights distilled from years of experience.

The book leads off with a description of the symptoms of stalled strategies that should be familiar to almost everyone who has spent a significant amount of time in large corporations. When I read this book, I was compelled to stop and think about why some of the strategic initiatives I've supported succeeded while others failed despite rigorous planning. This book brought the reasons into sharp relief.

Ms. Harper emphasizes that it's essential to gain active support from all of the key players that are impacted. This includes external influences such as alliance partners, wholesalers, regulatory agencies and the public. She explains how to do this in everyday language. She concludes by spelling out a sequence of practical steps that any change leader can follow with the confidence that he/she is doing everything possible to ensure success.

Pam Harper's book may have come out in 2002 but the insights are as fresh and relevant as yesterday's newspapers. Few companies made it through the recent financial crisis unscathed, and few strategic plans survived the turmoil.

This is an environment that tends to foster strategic gridlock, as the crisis exposes the persistent organizational problems that keep a company from achieving maximum performance. The seven roadblocks that Ms. Harper describes are even more harmful when an organization is emerging from a crisis than they are in the middle of it, since this is the time when the company's leaders are most likely to let down their guard and make a misstep.

Pam Harper's book defines a process for unlocking strategic gridlock through a plan for understanding the current situation, developing a plan that has alignment and then communicating and adjusting that plan.

I just learned about this book recently and I have begun to recommend it to my clients as a way to introduce them to the process of unlocking their own strategic gridlock.

Reviewed by Juanita Watson for Reader Views (8/06)

Pamela Harper is an internationally know speaker, author, and is the president of Business Advancement, Inc. She has over 20 years of experience as a consultant with companies ranging from small-business to Fortune 500. She is sought out by leaders in the business marketplace to transform their internal strategies and increase performance results.

The first part of "Preventing Strategic Gridlock"Harper reveals and explains seven of the most common hidden roadblocks that stall business growth. She outlines real-life examples of the step-by-step path to the downward slide giving readers a cut-and-dry visual of how this happens.

Part Two of "Preventing Strategic Gridlock" details Harper's six-step process for reducing the gridlock and enabling leaders to more smoothly integrate execution with strategic thinking and planning. Harper discovered these six principles and guidelines during her research and consulting experiences and research, and has formed U.N.L.O.C.K. to `unlock' performance.

Pamela Harper guides businesses to re-evaluate their strategies and enables leaders to run a more effective and efficient organization. Bottom line - Every business leader would benefit from having "Preventing Strategic Gridlock" on their resource shelf. It is educational, consistent, and proven effective, and will help leaders spot gridlock problems before they get out of control.

Received book free of charge.

The other day, I came across a very interesting book called Preventing Strategic Gridlock, by Pamela Harper. Ms. Harper is the President of Business Advancement Inc., a consulting firm dedicated to helping leaders transform strategy into high performance results. Check out the link to the article entitled The Key to Aligning Strategy with Execution on her website.

I really like Preventing Strategic Gridlock.

Ms. Harper begins her book be describing what she calls the Seven Hidden Roadblocks that come about because leaders have mistaken assumptions about their organizations' reality.

The Seven Hidden Roadblocks are:

1. One size fits all -- The tendency to adopt previously successful solutions without regard to whether they can work in your organization now.

2. Management by lobotomy -- The tendency to rely on organizational "surgery (layoffs, reorganizations, budge cuts) to solve persistent organizational problems.

3. Act now, think later -- The tendency to assume that you have enough information to select strategies and intiatives to meet your organization's real needs.

4. Magic of the marquee -- The tendency to expect the organization to instantly accept change.

5. Roller coaster -- The tendency to assume that introducing a rapid series of new strategies and initiatives will move the organization forward.

6. Tin ear -- The tendency to preceive only one "tone" of reality.

7. Lighthouse -- The tendency to "stay the course" despite clear cut danger signs.

Ms. Harper goes on to explain how to U.N.L.O.C.K. strategic gridlock

* U -- Understand the full challenge

* N -- Negotiate key stakeholder buy in

* L -- Locate cultural 'advancers and 'blockers"

* O -- Organize priorities, goals and action plans

* C -- Communicate credibly

* K -- Keep adjusting

I won't go into more detail here. You'll have to read the book yourself. However I believe that any leader who wants to move his or her organization forward will benefit from reading and applying the concepts in Preventing Strategic Gridlock.

Several studies of strategic management have found that around 70 percent of all new strategies fail. The main culprit is that they are not effectively executed. In many cases, the strategies would have been all but impossible to execute because the organization was overburdened with other challenges, did not have the resources in place and poorly communicated what was to be done.

Preventing Strategic Gridlock aims at overcoming those problems by both selecting more appropriate strategies to implement and avoiding the common pitfalls of execution for strategies that could be executed well by an organization.

The book is divided into two parts. The first part looks at the main causes of strategic gridlock (assuming anyone can execute any strategy any way they want, continuing to restructure and streamline to address strategic and implementation issues, being too quick and not considered enough in reacting to new problems, thinking that everyone knows what to do if you just announce a new program, switching to the flavor of the week fix so that everyone is confused and dispirited, not listening to what's not working, and not considering immovable obstacles to progress).

I loved that section. It reminded me of the first part of the book I co-authored The 2,000 Percent Solution, in which we looked at the stalls to organizational progress. These hidden roadblocks are illustrated with very funny cartoons that make the point very clear, good examples that you will understand, underlying beliefs that can get you into trouble, how to uncover the problem, a check list to help you see how bad the problem is in your organization, and a list of questions and answers to issues that you will probably be concerned about.

In the second part, Ms. Harper describes a six-step process organized around the acronym UNLOCK. This process encourages you to understand the full nature of the challenge you face, negotiating the enthusiastic participation of those who need to implement the new direction, considering how your culture can help or hurt in the change, organizing to get the work done, communicating in ways that make sense and to keep adjusting in response to what you run into.

I thought that the process was not quite sufficiently detailed for what most people will need to follow this advice. That was the only significant weakness in the book. But the second part does a fine job of raising the right issues.

Again, I was struck by the parallel to The 2,000 Percent Solution where we describe an eight-step process to make progress in our second part.

After sleeping on my reaction to the book, I feel like Ms. Harper has produced a 2,000 percent solution for overcoming the problems of making strategic change. Nice stallbusting, Ms. Harper!

I highly recommend this book to anyone who is thinking about developing or implementing a new strategy.

Pam Harper's does a great service to the pervasive, male-dominated (and I'm a male) culture of business leadership that thinks strategy only involves "making the numbers". In an engaging style, she uses the first half of her book to describe 7 common, but hidden roadblocks that companies can easily hit when they are tried to implement strategic growth through changing elements of their business. I like the chapter on "Tin Ear", where management has a tendency to tune out the opinions and concerns of others. The company may have an open door policy, quality circles, and a suggestion program (with cash rewards!) but may miss the more obvious daily chatter from employees, customers and other stakeholders that are providing valuable feedback.

The second half of the the book presents the author's UNLOCK methodology for addressing strategic gridlock. It contains 6 steps, with steps 2 and 3 (Understand the Full Challenge and Negociate Key Stakeholder Buy-in) as highlights. The focus on seeing the complete job to be done helps get the timeframe and effort to be more realistic, and the buy-in step focuses on how to play both offense and defense as you are communicating and implementing important changes.

Having your management team familar with these concepts will allow you to sense and discuss when you may be hitting roadblocks or not doing all the work to unlock your organizations full potential.

Highly reccomended read before you set off on your next strategic change journey.

Strategic Gridlock - when business strategies and initiatives come to a complete stop because of persistent organizational problems. Everyone understands the fatal implications of such a problem but few seem to understand how it comes about and how to get out of one. "Preventing Strategic Gridlock" provides an analysis of how seven "roadblocks" cause strategic gridlock and what to do about them.

The first part of the book goes over each of these roadblocks, what causes them to occur, the implications of each of them, their symptoms, and how to determine if you are experiencing them. Each of these chapters has a checklist to help keep out of gridlock, an interpretation section to define if you are experiencing the roadblock, a set of frequently asked questions, and a series of checkpoints that define the highlights of the chapter. Together these make the book very useful for anyone seeking to avoid gridlock or determine if they are in a gridlock situation.

The second part of the book contains the details of the U.N.L.O.C.K. system to resolve strategic gridlock. The technique is detailed and illustrated through examples. Throughout the book multiple real life scenarios illustrate each concept.

This is a recommended read for anyone experiencing gridlock in their organization or who wants to understand gridlock from the root causes to the moving beyond it.

Whether you are an aspiring entrepreneur or Fortune 500 executive, Preventing Strategic Gridlock is right for you. Pam Harper reveals many solutions that often plague the process of strategic business plan implementation. If you are seeking to build or develop a business, make its foundation rock solid by applying what you learn from Pam Harper!