Summary: “My job at Honeywell International these days is to restore the discipline of execution to a company that had lost it.” Execution, page 1 So begins Execution, a crisp eye-opener of a book widely considered by many to be the best book written on a discipline that lies at very heart of success. And rightly so, because this book is the intellectual fruit of a collaboration between two of the last century’s finest business minds – Ram Charan, the highly sought-after management consultant and theorist, and Larry Bossidy, the award-winning and seasoned executive, moulded by more than thirty years of high-powered leadership at General Electric and AlliedSignal, and nearly a decade more as Chairman and CEO of Honeywell International. Bossidy and Charan argue that the biggest pitfall facing businesses today is their inability to execute. Far from being unable to attract the brightest minds, innovate consistently or shave costs to reach a new zenith of efficiency, the slow decline and death of a business is often due to its inability to create an environment that encourages, recognizes and rewards the discipline of execution – the ability to coordinate human effort and generate outstanding results continuously, consistently and efficiently. Golden Egg Real Leaders Get Dirty “Many people regard execution as detail work that’s beneath the dignity of a business leader. That’s wrong. To the contrary, it’s a leader’s most important job.” Execution, page 1 Far from simply articulating a vision and parceling out work for subordinates to complete, the authors contend that it is a leader’s equal responsibility to both set direction and drive momentum in every aspect of their business – even if it takes them from formulating grand strategies to screwing in nuts and bolts, tweaking and fine-tuning operations designed to implement those very strategies. After all, only by serving in the trenches can you possibly begin to identify with, and understand the responsibilities of, the person you’re sending off to fight on your behalf. This was a lesson learnt and painstakingly implemented by Steve Jobs and Jamie Dimon. These two very different men, both from two strikingly different backgrounds, eventually ended up learning the same lesson from the ground-up; Jobs as he was soldering motherboards in his garage alongside fellow members of the Homebrew Computer Club, Dimon as he and his mentor Sandy Weill spent days and nights poring over spreadsheets and calculating ratios to identify the companies that they would one day take over and combine to build Citigroup. Wading into a ditch to do the work you’d rather have someone else do is humbling, and establishes a frame of mind that is focused on implementing solutions, leaving no problem unsolved, and looking for ways to simplify and minimize open-ended processes. All of these experiences are necessary components of the discipline of execution, and can be instrumental in the initial stages of setting up your new venture. A willingness to shoulder undesirable work and lead by example is a quality that is often over-promoted by many leaders but rarely exhibited in public. GEM # 1 The Bedrock of Your Church “The three processes – people, strategy, and operations – remain the building blocks and heart of good execution. But as the economic, political, and business environments change, the ways in which they are carried out also change.” Execution, page 14 Here’s how it breaks down: Whenever you’re bringing a group of people together, either to build a project team, staff a division or flesh out your executive branch, seek and hire only top talent. Don’t settle for “next-best alternatives”, “good enough” solutions or people who can just “get the job done”. In your quest for talent, be unreasonable, be demanding, and insist on only bringing on people who have demonstrated their worth and value to your endeavour. Anyone else is going to dilute your team’s capabilities.
