This week’s focus: When new CEOs, executive directors and other senior managers are appointed into their new role they often set themselves a 90-day challenge, so that they make sure that they hit the ground running. By establishing clear objectives, actions and timescales these executives make sure that they make real progress in their first three months on the job.
Yet it’s rare for the same executives to set themselves a similar challenge for their next 90 days in office. They simply start to operate in tandem with the wider organisation. Unsurprisingly, their level of progress and impact also subsides.
To be honest, I don’t understand this change in behaviour. I believe that rolling 90-day plans can have a transformative effect at all levels; individual, team and organisational. Three months is long enough to do something of real substance, but short enough to ensure rapid action.
When I worked for Boots, for instance, the company turned around a sales decline by implementing a 90-day focus on improving in-store product availability. This simple focus enabled the entire company to get behind a short programme that very quickly delivered sales improvements.
What about you and your business? What could you focus on in the next 90 days that would have a transformative effect on performance? And what would you then focus on in the following 90 days?
Off The Record: Days by The Kinks
Thank you for the days
Those endless days, those sacred days you gave me
I’m thinking of the days
I won’t forget a single day, believe me
© Stuart Cross 2015. All rights reserved.