How many times have we heard the expres­sion “you can’t see the for­est for the trees?”

I have worked with man­agers, includ­ing chief exec­u­tives, who stug­gle to see the big pic­ture and keep con­sis­tent focus on their over­all goals and busi­ness strat­egy. They become so immersed in day-to-day oper­a­tions that they don’t take time to sit back and view the landscape.

Most man­agers like the details; it’s what they know best. But when they don’t mon­i­tor how indi­vid­ual actions are fit­ting into the accom­plish­ment of their over­all goals, they may lose sight of their strate­gic vision.

As with so many things in life, bal­ance is important.

The exe­cu­tion of all the details required to man­age and lead a busi­ness is crit­i­cal in get­ting the expected results. It is equally impor­tant that you have a clear view of how those details fit into the over­all strate­gic vision and direction.

See­ing the For­est and the Trees

Goals are essen­tial ingre­di­ents for direc­tion and improve­ment. Hav­ing a goal that you are pas­sion­ate about helps to keep you and your team moti­vated. Your vision and goals drive your busi­ness strategy.

Of course, goals are mean­ing­less if you never take any steps toward achiev­ing them. Exe­cut­ing all the details required to accom­plish those goals in a coor­di­nated and planned way is what dri­ves con­sis­tent progress and results.

The trees are important.

At the same time, the for­est – or the over­all strate­gic end game – is how you know where the com­pany or team is going. The indi­vid­ual steps will get you nowhere if you are unclear about your destination.

You need to see the for­est and the trees. In my view, you can’t have one with­out the other. Both are important.

But how do you keep an eye on both at the same time?

It helps to have a good grasp of the major dri­vers required in the accom­plish­ment your goals. What crit­i­cal processes drive your busi­ness, and how can they be mea­sured? Check in reg­u­larly — be it hourly, daily, weekly, or monthly — on those com­po­nents that need to be reviewed to ensure you are mov­ing forward.

Remem­ber the old adage of “inspect­ing what you expect.” Expect those key things, and hold your­self and oth­ers account­able that they get done on time and at the level of qual­ity necessary.

Before you were a man­ager and a leader, you may have once be good at exe­cut­ing the detail. But your role is dif­fer­ent now. While you may still be great at those tasks, give oth­ers the oppor­tu­nity do their jobs, and put your focus where it is needed.

Keep a writ­ten copy of your vision and strate­gic goals in front of you – on a sheet of paper, your out­look, or a white board. This will serve as a con­stant reminder of where you are going.

Too often, man­agers get side­tracked by another new idea that comes along which seems excit­ing in the moment. They for­get to go back to their strat­egy and deter­mine if this new oppor­tu­nity is con­sis­tent with their over­all strate­gic direction.

Your team can also get con­fused and dis­tracted when they are sent run­ning in dif­fer­ent direc­tions, espe­cially if they are not clear on your long-term strat­egy. The chaos that results is unpro­duc­tive. Make sure all new tasks are con­sis­tent with your strate­gic direction.

Explor­ing Connections

Often there are oppor­tu­ni­ties to fur­ther lever­age what you are doing, but ade­quate time is not taken to make the con­nec­tion. That is why it is so crit­i­cal to set aside time to think and reflect, and yet this is not done con­sis­tently or often enough.

We all know that things hap­pen, and road­blocks threaten to get in our way. I fre­quently hear chief exec­u­tives say that it is good to “plan for the worst and hope for the best.” I agree, and to truly live out this advice I fur­ther belive it is nec­es­sary to sched­ule time to think and reflect on what issues might come up, and how best to pre­pare for them.

There are great oppor­tu­ni­ties out there that can yeild bet­ter results, but you will miss them if you don’t make the time to explore and ask ques­tions. Why isn’t this process work­ing bet­ter? If we imple­mented this new idea, would it get us closer to our goal? These kinds of ques­tions need to be asked con­sis­tently if you are to improve both the details of the busi­ness and the long-term accom­plish­ment of impor­tant goals.

Lead­ers must be orga­nized and have good pri­or­ity sys­tems in place. Stay­ing orga­nized will enable you to free up time so that you can ade­quately explore the oppor­tu­ni­ties out there, and iden­tify those that will help you to improve.

Details are impor­tant, but the right details are more impor­tant. Keep focused on where you are going, and those details will get you where you want to be.

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Tags: Big Picture, Details, Goals, Opportunities, Perspective

This entry was posted on Monday, April 5th, 2010 at 8:53 am and is filed under Vision. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.