Over the past 30 years I’ve asked business leaders across an array of industries how well their current strategy is working, and heard a wide range of answers.

Some changed the subject (aka, dodged the question, while essentially answering it with their lack of response). Others provided examples of how they are moving in the direction of achieving their long-term strategic goals. A few suggested (often a bit defensively) that a long-term strategy is irrelevant because things change too quickly and there is too much uncertainty. Many (including a few credit union CEOs) admitted that they’ve never even defined a long-term strategy because they’ve been too busy running the business.

When I ask the same leaders how effectively they are executing their strategic plans, the answer is almost always “not as effectively as we would like.”

Here are the seven reasons given by these CEOs for why this strategy-execution gap occurs.

continue reading »