Time is the sparsest of all resources. Use it wisely. It’s not so much about time management as it is about strategic management.

Management tends to focus on the issues of the day more often than on strategic application. Each person in an executive team has areas that they are accountable for and these demand attention. Operational issues rise to the top and need attention. The squeaky wheel gets the oil. Strategic issues develop no fires, no embarrassments, and no sudden breakdowns so it’s never an attention grabber. Many companies don’t get to see that they are missing strategic targets until the first quarter; even then they may dismiss the results as a blip in the economy and wait for the second quarter. It takes half the year to realize there is a problem. It will probably take longer to get back on track. Which means another year of underperformance? Can you afford it?

So how does your team schedule strategic meetings. Do you even schedule strategic meetings? If you analyze where your top management teams time is spent, you may be surprised to see what they spend it on. Executive and management teams don’t need more than a few hours per month focusing on strategic direction but it needs to be quality time and it needs to be focused.

As with dialogue and discussion, strategic action needs more decision making than discussion. Discussion leads to no further understanding but rather a delay in decision making. Discussions around areas that have already been strategically determined are counterproductive and waste time. It was determined to be of strategic importance when it was developed so let’s not refocus efforts in the wrong areas. Focus rather on making decisions.

Make sure your strategy meetings are not hijacked by the most current fire that’s being fought. Have another forum for operational meetings.

To ensure that you achieve the objectives of your strategy meeting:

1. Decide before the meeting which activities are valuable. This may be the team leader’s job or can be done in a quick whip around e-mail each manager assigning a point to each item.

2. Add a financial value to the ramifications of not doing anything. This will keep you focused on the important things.

3. Rapidly move items through the process of decision making. There is no point in having older items take valuable strategic time from the group. Avoid analysis paralysis and keep things moving forward.

4. Ensure there are alternatives available for the team to make. Just as in a sales presentation give the members a choice of three things to choose and let them understand the reasons behind their choices.

5. Develop a process for making strategic decisions. Let it be known and used to monitor and track outcomes.

6. Make sure that a decision once made is not reneged on by managers.

Ensuring that your strategic direction remains on track is important to an Organization. Following the above guidelines can be achieved by following the 'Best Year Yet' program.

For more information on time management read Stop Wasting Valuable Time by Michael C. Mankins, HBR September 2004 pp27 – 35. Read it to gain further insights.

Graeme Nichol, MBA, principal Arcturus Advisors (http://www.arcturusadvisors.com), has worked on 4 continents gaining experience through Big Six consulting companies and boutique firms. Including; Business strategy, project management, change management, systems thinking, developing learning organizations, team development, productivity and quality improvement, and large scale ERP implementations.

At Arcturus Advisors we work with business leaders and their teams to get everybody on the same page pulling in the same direction to improve results. We get you to focus on a shared vision and agree on how you want to achieve it.

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