How You Can Meet Your #1 Leadership Challenge RUSSELL

A Special Leadership In FastTime® Report
Excellence In Execution
HOW YOU CAN

MEET YOUR #1
LEADERSHIP
CHALLENGE
FOR THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY
By Leland A. Russell
LEADERSHIP Think Strategically Focus Sharply Move Quickly LEADERSHIP Think Strategically Focus Sharply Move Quickly
EXCELLENCE IN EXECUTION
HOW YOU CAN MEET YOUR #1 LEADERSHIP CHALLENGE
TOUGH AT THE TOP

“Execution” is the leadership challenge most commonly mentioned by leaders today—
regardless of size of company or type of industry. Behind this trend is a fundamental fact:
it’s increasingly tough at the top. No, I mean really tough.
Leaders today are facing a ‘perfect

storm’ of complexity and change
created by an unprecedented array
of driving forces. The pace of
communications, the blurring of
geographic boundaries and the
instantaneous mobility of ideas
spawn new challenges. Competition
is no longer predictable in time,
place, or specifics. Disruptive
innovations, appearing seemingly overnight, can suddenly endanger a long-successful
business or make an entire industry obsolete. In this environment—the New Normal—
even the most vaunted leadership practices may not be enough.
Whether you are a seasoned leader at the top or an emerging leader on the way up,
you’ve probably found that executing effectively in today’s environment can be a
challenge, and you’re not alone. A wide range of research reveals that 70% to 90% of
organizations are failing to execute effectively. It’s not surprising that, when an
international research group asked CEOs from 40 countries to rate their greatest concerns
from a list of 121 different challenges, “Excellence In Execution” was ranked #1.
What does it take to achieve “Excellence In Execution” and what are the benefits?
The Leadership In FastTime® Model we will present in this article is a proven formula
for Excellence In Execution. It has been acknowledged as highly effective by top leaders
of many well-known, forward-leaning organizations. The benefits are faster, better results
in thinking, planning and implementation that drive breakthrough performance.
The Leadership In FastTime® Model has three imperatives for realizing these benefits:
Smart Strategic Thinking without Wasting Time

Sharply Focused Planning that Leverages Resources
Fast-Cycle Implementation with Real-Time Learning
© 2010 Leland A. Russell | For more information email FastTime@geogroup.net or call (877) 855-2050 1
A PROVEN FORMULA
The Leadership In FastTime® Model emerged from our research and hands-on work with
hundreds of leaders in the Fortune 500, as well as leaders of non-profits, government
agencies and the military. An especially useful source has been the leaders of the Desert
Storm air campaign—one of the most successful campaigns in military history. Because
of its size and complexity and the fact that it was such a rapid victory, it contains valuable
lessons for meeting the Execution challenges of the New Normal.
We presented what we learned from Desert

“Winning in FastTime® should be a
Storm in the book Winning In FastTime,
required handbook for 21st century
which I co-authored with Colonel John leaders. It provides a road map that can
Warden, the architect of the air campaign. help make the difference between winning
and losing."
During one of our writing sessions, I asked — Marshall Goldsmith, named by The
Colonel Warden a seminal question, “How Wall Street Journal as one of the top ten
executive educators, by Forbes as one of
would you describe the success formula of the five most- respected executive
Desert Storm?” He paused for a moment and coaches, and the Economist as one of
the most credible consultants in the new
then crisply replied, “Think Strategically, era of business
Focus Sharply, and Move Quickly.” This
summed up in six words a proven approach to rapid success in a complex, fast-changing
environment.
The following year I began to deliver Winning In FastTime

keynotes and executive briefings to non-military audiences. It was
soon apparent that “Think Strategically, Focus Sharply, Move
Quickly,” resonated with leaders because it provides a
comprehensive mental model—three essential mindsets—for
achieving Excellence In Execution in the 21st century.
Mindset 1 – Think Strategically
Organizations that consistently win in the New Normal have one thing
in common—committed proactive leaders who think strategically about
the organization’s challenges and opportunities and act accordingly.
That was the case with our client Texas Instruments (TI). For over ten
years, during a period when many of its competitors, including Intel and
Motorola, were experiencing major growth in their market value, TI’s
market value was flat. By the mid 1990’s, TI’s leaders began to realize that the problem
was not their tactical capabilities. It was a lack of smart strategic thinking.
So how did TI put that insight into practice and what was the result?
In a series of strategic thinking sessions that engaged over two hundred top leaders, they
shaped a new vision and new strategic focus. Instead of continuing to fight competitors
for a share of the memory chip market, TI targeted the explosive market for digital signal
processors—DSPs, which are a key component of Internet and mobile communication
devices. And, most importantly, they decided to dominate the DSP market. They sold
their huge defense unit, a sacred
cow, in order to pump more money
into the DSP effort. In an interview
with the Wall Street Journal the
CEO declared, "This isn't a market
we want to play in; this is the
market where we intend to win."
And they did win and win big: TI’s
market value increased six-fold
over the next three years.
Mindset 2 – Focus Sharply
In our consulting and coaching work, we’ve found that there’s a

consistent concern among leaders who are responsible for
implementing strategies—resource constraints. They wonder if they
have the enough resources to achieve breakthrough performance.
In today’s environment, resource constraints are always going be a

factor, but there’s a proven solution: sharply focus your available resources on the
Leverage Points in your organization and market for optimal impact.
What is a Leverage Point?
The trim tab on a boat rudder is a good example of a Leverage Point. Buckminster Fuller,
the futurist best known for coining the term "Spaceship Earth," explained it this way:
Think of the Queen Mary—there's a tiny thing at the edge of the rudder
called a trim tab. It's a miniature rudder. Just moving the little trim tab builds
a low pressure that pulls the rudder around. It takes almost no effort at all.
Every successful executive

intuitively knows the ‘People’
Leverage Points within their
own organizations. That is
why, when they want to get
something done, they reach out
to the key Leverage Points—
board members, other senior
executives, top customers and
the informal leaders that the
rank-and-file in the organization tend to follow. What may not be so obvious are the
process and physical infrastructure Leverage Points, such as strategy making and
leadership decision-making (processes) and technology infrastructure (physical).
The key to having optimal impact with your available resources and significantly
increasing your probability of success is to sharply focus on the key Leverage Points and
affect a critical mass of them in the right way at the right time.
Mindset 3 – Move Quickly
There is a fundamental truth about leadership in a world that is

operating on Internet Time: laggards lose. Organizations need speed,
and the speed of the leader and their team determines the speed of
the organization. The world's most successful companies have
leaders who move quickly to spot new opportunities, mobilize
resources and bring new products and services to market in a flash.
A prime example is Virgin Group’s Sir Richard Branson. You are probably familiar with
the Virgin brand from its music megastores and airlines. What you may not know is how
rapidly Virgin has launched one new business after another 1. “Often the window of
opportunity is very small," explains Branson. "So speed is of the essence."
In the vast majority of situations, time is NOT on your side — the slower you move, the
less chance you have of achieving your objectives. One reason is Murphy's Law, which
states that "anything that can go wrong will go wrong." Another reason for speed is the
ever-changing environment. No matter how theoretically perfect your original plan may
be, as the execution timeline lengthens, its value depreciates because the context changes.
1
Business Week, March 27, 2006
Those who operate with a Move Quickly mindset tend to win for a number of reasons:
• External competitors are outpaced.
• Internal opposition to change is pre-empted.
• Key planning assumptions don’t become obsolete.
• There are fewer unanticipated consequences.
• Implementation gaps quickly surface and can be corrected.
• Fast wins create a positive psychology in the organization.
• Desired results and benefits are accelerated.
How fast should you move? The answer is simple: “I am truly amazed by how much we
move at the speed you need to succeed. With few accomplished in how little time. With the
exceptions, this means moving faster than the rate FastTime® approach, we met some very
aggressive goals very quickly.”
of change in your environment and faster than — Hardy Wentzel,
your competitors. Leader, Weyerhaeuser Canada
NINE SUCCESS PRINCIPLES

The three critical mindsets we’ve just reviewed—Think Strategically, Focus Sharply,
Move Quickly—are the foundation of Leadership In FastTime®. They provide a holistic
mental model for leading Execution in the New Normal, a model that contains nine
success principles. Before we review them, let’s clarify our defintion of “principle.”
A principle is a concise statement of a fundamental truth within a specific context. For

example, a few years ago an adventurous family decided to go backpacking in Alaska.
The wilderness area they planned to visit had a large population of grizzly bears. Since
the family had never before been in bear country, they decided to visit the National Park
Service Center for a presentation on “Safety in Bear Country.” The Park Ranger strongly
emphasized one core fact: bears, if annoyed or surprised, can be very dangerous. He
concluded his presentation with a key principle for bear safety: “Make noise!”
The principle “Make noise!” provides a guideline for ensuring personal safety in a
potentially dangerous environment—bear country. Likewise, the nine principles for
Leadership In FastTime® provide guidelines for ensuring success in a challenging
leadership environment, a dynamic landscape of complexity and rapid change.
As depicted in the chart below, each of the nine principles is an antidote for one or more
of the common obstacles to effective Execution.
Execution Obstacles Success Principles

Narrow Perspectives / Blind Spots See The Big Picture
Strategically
THINK
Knee-Jerk Short-Term Solutions Design Your Future Picture
Behavioral / Cultural Inertia Adopt Winning Behaviors
Underestimating What It Takes Understand The System

Sharply
FOCUS
Striving for Perfect Plans Create Good Enough Plans
Obsolete Structures / Processes Organize For Rapid Success
Lack of Alignment and Velocity Orchestrate Parallel Actions

Quickly
MOVE
Failure to Learn / Course Correct Improve While You Move

Beginning / Ending Things Poorly Lead The Transitions
Think Strategically Principles
• Principle One, See The Big Picture, is an antidote for the narrow perspectives and
blind spots that can lead to bad decisions, missed opportunities and unintended
consequences. It provides guidelines for developing realistic situational awareness.
• Principle Two, Design Your Future Picture, is an antidote for the knee-jerk solutions
that compound current problems and fail to move you in a strategically smart direction.
It provides guidelines for setting objectives and shaping strategies and measures.
• Principle Three, Adopt Winning Behaviors is an antidote for the status quo ways of
doing things that are often counterproductive. It provides guidelines for defining and
practicing the behaviors and cultural norms that will help you achieve success.
Focus Sharply Principles
• Principle Four, Understand The System, is an antidote for underestimating what it

takes to overcome the inertia of the status quo. It provides guidelines for building a
shared understanding of the Leverage Points of the system in which you’re operating.
• Principle Five, Create Good Enough Plans is an antidote for allowing the desire for
perfection to be the enemy of the good. It provides guidelines for shaping Action
Roadmaps that allow you to move forward quickly to build momentum.
• Principle Six, Organize for Rapid Success, is an antidote for the tendency to maintain
outdated structures and processes because they are politically expedient. It provides
guidelines for organizing resources to support fast-cycle implementation.
Move Quickly Principles
• Principle Seven, Orchestrate Parallel Actions, is an antidote for lack of speed and
being derailed by a single failure. It provides guidelines for implementing multiple
actions plans to affect a critical mass of Leverage Points.
• Principle Eight, Improve While You Move, is an antidote for the failure to quickly
learn from mistakes and rapidly course correct. It provides guidelines for continuously
assessing outcomes regularly with a singular focus on getting better faster results. .
• Principle Nine, Lead The Transitions, is an antidote for weak beginnings and endings
that waste time and resources. It provides guidelines for starting initiatives and projects
in a smart way and finishing them with finesse.
Each of the nine principles includes some specific leadership actions that help translate it
into a practical, understandable process. For example, the leadership actions for Principle
One, See The Big Picture, are:
Assess Current Reality

Explore The Future
Identify Strategic Issues
The graphic below presents the Leadership In FastTime® mindsets, principles and
actions in one easy-to-grasp “Rule of Three” architecture: there are three mindsets, each
mindset has three principles and each principle has three actions.
Leadership In FastTime® Model

THINK
Strategically
See The Design Your Adopt Winning

Big Picture Future Picture Behaviors
• Assess Current Reality • Define Strategic Goals • Avoid Self-Deceit

• Explore The Future • Create Winning Strategies • Know What It Takes To Win
• Identify Strategic Issues • Make Success Measurable • Seek Real-Time Feedback
FOCUS
Sharply
PRINIPLES
Understand The Create Good Organize For

Whole System Enough Plans Rapid Success
ACTIONS
• Clarify System Boundaries • Identify Leverage Points • Secure Required Resources
• Define A Common Language • Define Desired Effects • Define Rules of Engagement
• Identify Relevant Components • Develop Action Roadmaps • Mobilize Your Stakeholders
MOVE
Quickly
Orchestrate Improve While Lead The

Parallel Actions You Move Transitions
• Form An Orchestration Team • Conduct After Action Reviews • Start Smartly
• Establish An Action Rhythm • Monitor Results and Metrics • Accelerate Transformations
• Facilitate Feedback Loops • Course Correct Quickly • Finish With Finesse
*The value of this kind of architecture was discovered years ago by Calvin Thorpe and
George Rowland at the Bell Telephone Laboratories. They found that grouping
information in clusters of three greatly increases an individual's working memory 2.
2 Lewis, D. & Greene, J., Thinking Better. New York: Rawson, Wade Publishers 1982.
APPLYING THE MODEL FOR PERFORMANCE IMPROVEMENT

Our research and experience indicates that most organizations have opportunities for
performance improvement in one or more of three key areas: (a) shaping a winning
strategy for current market conditions; (b) aligning workforce goals and actions with the
strategy; (c) quickly and effectively implementing initiatives and projects.
For the past decade, our consulting focus has been

“The FastTime® principles were at the
on helping leaders meet their toughest Execution core of the transformation at Motorola.
challenges in these three areas. We have applied the We used them to launch fast,
Leadership In FastTime Model and a supporting fundamental change and they worked!”
— Sandy Ogg
online toolkit to Execution issues in each area with Former Corporate Director and
consistent success. corporate transformation leader
Motorola Corporation
They say “the proof is in the pudding,” so let’s look
at two diverse examples of Leadership In FastTime Execution results, one in a large
organization with thousands of employees and one in a small organization with nine
employees.
FastTime Results in a Large Organization

The U.S. Industrial Business of a Fortune 500 wood product corporation urgently needed
to develop and implement a new strategy to combat some significant challenges:
• Sales growth was stagnant and two previous efforts to address the problem had failed.
• There was a poor history of translating desired changes into action because
participants did not understand and support the changes.
• The organization had just reorganized into a matrix structure and implementation was
under the authority of 10 different regional managers throughout the US and Canada.
• The larger business segments overshadowed the Industrial Business and getting
regional leadership commitment to implementation was extremely difficult.
• The corporation was in the midst of integrating a major acquisition, which required a
significant number of regional personnel to be on transition teams.
• The costs in both time and travel to physically convene regional participants were
beyond the available budget.
Using the Leadership In FastTime rapid-cycle planning process and web-based planning
tools, we guided the leadership group through a 90-day process that produced what
proved to be a breakthrough strategy. The group consisted of 15 representatives from

throughout the US and Canada who met online each week. The process concluded with a
two-day onsite session that vetted the 17 project plans and immediately obtained top
management support for implementation.
Given the failure of the previous efforts, the corporation’s CEO was clearly pleased with
the business results that were reported 12 months later:
• Sales were up 10 percent—the highest-ever
rate of sales growth in a market that grew less “The FastTime process helped our Industrial
Division rapidly develop a superior strategy
than 3 percent. that not only produced short term-results, and
• Net profits were up 58 percent. strong momentum for the long term. It also
helped establish an Execution culture, which
• Return on assets was up 60 percent.
gives us a significant competitive advantage.”
• Headcount was reduced by 10 percent. — Ed Jones
Director of Industrial Planning
• Total business investment held constant. Weyerhaeuser Corporation
• Share of key market segments increased.
FastTime Results in a Small Organization
A regional paging company based in Orange County California offers another Leadership
In FastTime success story. This company was in deep trouble because the cell phone
market had suddenly exploded and put their paging business on a rapid road to
obsolescence. The industry as a whole had no long-term prospects—four of the five
national paging companies had recently declared bankruptcy.
Using the FastTime System Mapping Process, we determined that this small firm had
three valuable assets: experience with sophisticated billing systems, an established
network of merchant customers across southern California and a small staff of 9 capable,
committed people who worked well together. With those insights, we conducted a two-
day strategic planning session that included an outside-the-box opportunity search. We
then followed up with a 90-day executive coaching process with the CEO.
The result was a breakthrough strategy that put the

“We were on the road to extinction
firm on a path to extraordinary success—a because of the transition away from
strategy based on a Point-of-Sale Activation pagers to mobile phones. Then, we
(POSA) technology that allowed its existing learned and aggressively applied the
Leadership In FastTime® tools and the
network of merchant customers to create a new results were extraordinary.”
profit center for their business. — Cliff Thompkins
The new strategy delivered hyper-growth for this small firm with no outside capital
infusion and no increase in their headcount. The gross revenue tells the success story:
$300,000 in year one, $9.5 million in year two, $52 million in year three and $150
million in year four—at which time the CEO was able to sell the firm for $20 million.
SUMMARY
The Leadership In FastTime® Model is a proven formula for Excellence In Execution.
The benefits of applying it are faster, better results in thinking, planning and
implementation that together drive breakthrough performance.
Smart Strategic Thinking without Wasting Time

Sharply Focused Planning that Leverages Resources
Fast-Cycle Implementation with Real-Time Learning
Whether you are a seasoned leader at the top or an emerging leader on the way up, the
Leadership In FastTime Model can help you and your organization improve Execution
performance because:
• The three mindsets—Think Strategically, Focus Sharply, Move Quickly—provide the
essential conceptual framework for leading Excellence In Execution in the New Normal.
•The nine principles provide guidelines for anticipating and overcoming the common
obstacles to Excellence In Execution.
• Each principle is translated into practical actions that can be measured, evaluated and
reinforced to ensure performance improvement.
•The Model’s “Rule of Three” architecture—three mindsets, each mindset has three
principles and each principle has three actions—makes it easy to learn and apply.
•It is a disciplined, proven methodology that focuses on the Execution practices,
processes and tools that leaders, managers and mission-critical teams need to win.
When you think about the potential value of learning and applying the Leadership In
FastTime Model personally, or in your organization, consider these questions:
• What are your most significant Execution challenges and opportunities today?
• What are some of the potential costs of delay in solving even one of those problems?
• What are some of the potential benefits of acceleration of even one opportunity?
________________________________________________________________________
DEVELOPING YOUR EXCELLENCE IN EXECUTION

For the past decade, hundreds of leaders in a wide range of organizations have applied the
Leadership In FastTime Model and its supporting toolkit to meet their toughest Execution
challenges.
Our first steps with a new client are typically to: (1) assess their current Execution challenges and
improvement opportunities; and (2) conduct an onsite briefing with a good cross-section of those
who have Execution responsibilities. The purpose of the briefing is to provide an overview of the
assessment results and shape a path forward, which could take three forms:
 Providing comprehensive consulting and coaching to help senior leaders and their teams
accelerate action on the assessment recommendations.
 Designing and delivering scalable training programs for leaders and managers who have key
Execution responsibilities. These programs are customized for the organization and its business
units based on the assessment and they have a strong “learning by doing” component.
 Working with one or more mission-critical teams to accelerate Execution of a priority

project or initiative, with hands-on consulting and real-time knowledge transfer to the team.
If you are interested in learning more about how you might use the Leadership in FastTime
Model personally, or with your team or organization, please email FastTime@geogroup.net
or call us at 877-855-2050.
Click here to go to our Blog to see what others are saying about this report.
To learn more about Leadership In FastTime®:
• Follow us on TWITTER
• Participate in our BLOG
• Join us on FACEBOOK or LINKEDIN
The author of this article, Leland Russell, is co-author of Winning In FastTime and President of GEO Group Strategic Services..
Russell and his GEO Group colleagues have successfully served a wide range of leaders in all sectors. Their typical clients are
CEO’s, heads of business units, corporate functions and leadership teams who face tough Execution challenges.
"A very big personal thanks for all that you did for me and my team. The FastTime®
Mentoring process has proven to be a turning point in the Execution of our business."
— Barney Saunders, Agilent Technologies
Former Vice President & General Manager of Bio-Research Solutions

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A Special Leadership In FastTime® Report

HOW YOU CAN

TOUGH AT THE TOP

Leaders today are facing a ‘perfect

Smart Strategic Thinking without Wasting Time

We presented what we learned from Desert

The following year I began to deliver Winning In FastTime

Mindset 1 – Think Strategically

Mindset 2 – Focus Sharply

In our consulting and coaching work, we’ve found that there’s a

In today’s environment, resource constraints are always going be a

What is a Leverage Point?

Every successful executive

Mindset 3 – Move Quickly

There is a fundamental truth about leadership in a world that is

NINE SUCCESS PRINCIPLES

A principle is a concise statement of a fundamental truth within a specific context. For

Execution Obstacles Success Principles

Knee-Jerk Short-Term Solutions Design Your Future Picture

Behavioral / Cultural Inertia Adopt Winning Behaviors

Underestimating What It Takes Understand The System

Striving for Perfect Plans Create Good Enough Plans

Obsolete Structures / Processes Organize For Rapid Success

Lack of Alignment and Velocity Orchestrate Parallel Actions

Failure to Learn / Course Correct Improve While You Move

Think Strategically Principles

Focus Sharply Principles

• Principle Four, Understand The System, is an antidote for underestimating what it

Move Quickly Principles

Assess Current Reality

Leadership In FastTime® Model

See The Design Your Adopt Winning

• Assess Current Reality • Define Strategic Goals • Avoid Self-Deceit

Understand The Create Good Organize For

Orchestrate Improve While Lead The

APPLYING THE MODEL FOR PERFORMANCE IMPROVEMENT

For the past decade, our consulting focus has been

FastTime Results in a Large Organization

proved to be a breakthrough strategy. The group consisted of 15 representatives from

FastTime Results in a Small Organization

The result was a breakthrough strategy that put the

Smart Strategic Thinking without Wasting Time

DEVELOPING YOUR EXCELLENCE IN EXECUTION

 Working with one or more mission-critical teams to accelerate Execution of a priority

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