Long vs short

Are you a long-term thinker or short-term doer?

Hard-wired into the competency frameworks of some of the world's most admired companies, is a logic that to progress in their career people need to think more strategically and longer-term.

This is reflected in traditional hierarchies. The brand manager will be involved in the annual plan, the marketing director probably owns a 3-year strategy, whereas the Board sets the 10-year vision.

Somehow, long- versus short-term gets framed as a kind of binary choice. You’re either a long-term “thinker” or a short-term “doer”.

Individuals may have a preference or strength and, unwittingly, may promote others who reflect their bias.

Sometimes, this distinction is the basis of an entire organisational design, with brand development the domain of one team and market implementation done by another.

But in reality, they are not mutually exclusive. Being “long-term” doesn’t guarantee success. And focusing on the day-to-day doesn’t doom the business to end up in the wrong place.

In fact, if you were going to do only one or the other, you’d choose tactics over strategy because the first priority (for a person or a business) is survival.

Both short and long are important. And they are complementary.

No plan yields results until it’s put into action. If we only think long term, we may run out of cash, be undermined by a competitor, or blind-sided by a political development before your plan gets anywhere near execution.

Conversely, if we have foresight and a reasoned point of view about the market and our desired place within it, this acts as a compass for day-to-day decision making. Having a clear strategy makes the growth opportunities more obvious, and distractions easier to avoid.

One client, Amanda, who I worked with for several years, secured several promotions. Over a period of about eight years, she successfully climbed from a mid-level marketing position to board member.

One of the characteristics that sets Amanda apart from her one-time-peers, is how she places importance on both delivering short-term results (volume & profit) but does so in the context of long-term value drivers (such as consumer insight & developing people).

Her laser-like focus on execution, and pride in hitting monthly and quarterly targets, has generated bags of credibility with other functions and the owners. In fact, my sense is that her stakeholders are more confident to provide more resources for her longer-term plans precisely because there are relatively few concerns over the short-term business performance.

Questions for you

? In practice does your team place importance on both short- and long-term?

? What signals do you send them about where to place the emphasis?

? What actions may be needed to rebalance?

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