Thinking Big: Where Vision Meets Traction

Earlier I shared with you my Dubai-inspired video blog, Thinking Big. Today, I’m building on that post, showing how to achieve that big goal. I’m talking about where Vision meets Traction.

Get your big goal out of your head and into a plan. Learn how to break that BIG audacious goal down into 3-year and 1-year goals and how to choose Quarterly Rocks to ensure you reach those goals. Watch the video below and learn how it all fits together.

Or you can read the transcription below.

Hi, I am Chris Jones with Strategic Traction. Today we’re going to talk about when Vision meets Traction.

From the previous video (Thinking Big), we learned to set our big goal, that 10-year target, that game-changing powerful thing that we’re all chasing. Now, we need an action plan in order to achieve that goal. And even more importantly, we’ve got to execute on that action plan. This is where Vision meets Traction.

Most companies fail to achieve their vision, their big goals, due to a weakness in Traction. As Confucius said, “You move a mountain one stone at a time.” In order to achieve our big goal, we have got to achieve a bunch of smaller goals in order to get there.

Let’s pretend we are going to build a tower. Calgary could use a new tower, right? You can hardly see the Calgary Tower anymore. What is that game-changing goal that we are going to set?

Let’s pretend that we are a company that our only goal is to do that. It might look something like: Build the world’s tallest, most audacious building by 2027. To demonstrate how we connect Vision to Traction, I am going walk you through the process of using the EOS? Vision Traction Organizer or VTO? and show you a game-plan to achieve that big goal.

[I’m not a tower builder, so go easy on me. This is just for example purposes so it may not be builder accurate, okay?]

Our next step is painting a 3-year picture of where we’re going. If we want people to buy-in to our game plan to achieve our big goal, we’d better let them know what it looks like. And this starts with getting our leadership team on the same page. First, we’ll need to get the vision of where the organization is going out of our heads. Then the team literally spells it out on paper what the company would look like in 3 years.

In this situation, our 3-year picture might look something like this: Our land use has been approved, our architectural drawings are complete, our financing partners are in place, our project management team has been hired and is ready to go, and we have set a shovel in-ground date. This should be an exciting, motivating picture that if every part our plan is complete in 3 years, we’re pretty fired up. If we can see it, we’re more likely to get there, plus it’s going to make our 1-year planning, which is where we’re going next, a lot easier.

Okay, let’s zoom into our 1-year plan. We know our 3-year markers, so now we need to create a list of what we have to get done in the next 12 months, that handful of “must do’s” that have to happen in the next year, that come hell or high water. These are the things that we have to get done, no matter what. 3 to 7 items, hopefully, closer to 3, because less is always more in this process. Not 37, 3 to 7.

In our example, the 1-year goals could be: we’ve hired a project manager, the architect has been hired with the first draft of the architectural work complete, and our finance proposal is complete.

Next, we need to dial in the details for those critical Quarterly Rocks, those priorities that we have to accomplish in the next 90 days so that we can create laser focus around our efforts. Our Quarterly Rocks ensure that there are no distractions keeping us from achieving our massive project. We’ve got to keep it on the rails. Set 3 to 7 priorities for the quarter. That’s 3 to 7 Rocks, hopefully, closer to 3. Again, less is more.

Here’s what it might look like in our huge tower example: our project scope has been completed, our project manager role is defined with the recruiting started, and our architectural shortlist is complete.

You can see how one thing leads to the next. There is a trickle-down effect if we fail in any one area. For example, if we fail to achieve our Quarterly Rock of project scope completed, it’s going to impact our 1-year goal of completing our financing proposal, which then is going to hinder the chance of completing our 3-year picture of getting our financing partners in place. You can see the reliance from Quarterly Rocks to 1-year goals to the 3-year picture. It calls out the importance of Quarterly Rocks because nothing happens until these get done.

I hope this video example helps you create focus so that you can achieve your big goal of building your symbolic tower. And I hope that your team understands the critical role that they play in achieving all of your goals and Quarterly Rocks.

If you want a sample of the VTO? that we built today, contact us at StrategicTraction.ca. We’d be more than happy to share the example with you.

Now go build your tower one Rock at a time so that your Vision gains Traction.

NEXT STEPS:

• Get your tower building version of the VTO? as discussed in the video.
• Learn more about EOS? here.
• Want help implementing EOS?? Contact me

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