EXECUTIVE ENABLEMENT
The Head of Strategy is critical to the success of any organisation. They are responsible for not only the creation of the corporate strategy, but also for ensuring that their strategies can adapt to the market volatilities, critical uncertainties, and competitive ambiguities it will inevitably face. They design and optimise growth initiatives, manage strategic planning processes, and secure the stakeholder commitment needed to drive meaningful change.
They adapt in real-time to emerging challenges and short-term obstacles, while always staying focused on the long-term objectives of your company.
Why do strategists struggle to move their organisations forward?
Here’s what they are up against:
The budget for their department remains stagnant. Even though they create immense value, Strategy is viewed as a cost centre. Quantifying their contributions to revenue is near impossible, which means they are not allocated the resources needed to build better strategies.
Their executive committee and senior leaders resist change, play internal politics, or proactively choose to ignore their guidance to the detriment of organisational progress.
They are expected to design and deliver on almost all aspects of their organisation’s growth, competitiveness, and sustainability goals. Yet the implementation of their strategies is met with hostility and resistance, from both business lines and those who control the resources.
Given the scale of the challenge, it may seem that the only way for Heads of Strategy to successfully implement their strategy is to get the stamp of approval from a big-name consultancy.
Working with a consultancy is not always in their best interest
Partners of these organisations often pass themselves off as the ultimate authorities in strategic advisory. However, many will simply take the good work you have already done and regurgitate it back to the Executive Leadership Team as their own “validated” strategy.
In actuality, the MO of large consultancies is to “sell up” through identifying big problems and magnifying them as urgent — even if they aren’t necessarily critical for success. This in turn expands their project scope beyond what you really need, which generates more billable work for them. Need proof? The business models and remuneration structures of large consultancies show this to be true.
Alternatively, Heads of Strategy may call on “boutique” consultancies for help. Due to their own resourcing constraints and bench capacity, they may ignore the complex yet essential groundwork your strategy team has built with the business lines. Instead, they will produce a strategy so high-level that it is devoid of operational context, resourcing reality, and cultural fit.
And should any of these strategies be approved and their execution fail, it is the Head of Strategy’s responsibility to undo the damage the consultants have caused — which takes them back where they started, only now with a damaged reputation and diminished trust from their leadership teams and business partners.
There is a better way.
Executive Enablement with Adam Cox
As your advisor and thought partner, Adam will teach you the strategy of becoming a more effective Head of Strategy and a better leader. You’ll get the full benefit of the skills, knowledge, and wisdom he has acquired from 30+ years of experience working both in and on organisations like yours.
His partnership with hundreds of Heads of Strategy has transformed their strategic thinking, revolutionised their day-to-day practice, and enlivened their career prospects.
How you’ll benefit from the Executive Enablement Programme
- Give yourself the platform you need to be more effective in your role, with the confidence to deliver better thinking, shape better strategies, and drive better outcomes.
- Gain the insights you require to strip back strategic and operational problems to their “first principles”. Enable yourself to diagnose the root causes of complex and evolving challenges more clearly, and subsequently identify and put in place the best ways to move forward.
- Transform into a more efficient executive through the practical application of battle-tested solutions that have worked for hundreds of strategists like you.
- Learn to work through the complexities of your role and equip yourself with tools that the average Head of Strategy is not able to draw upon. With increased capability comes increased influence and trust in your leadership, allowing you to bridge the strategy-to-execution gap.
- Improve your ability to communicate more effectively, amplifying your voice with your organisation. Gain the capacity to develop messaging that will be listened to, be taken seriously, and that will drive the strategic change necessary for your company to grow and thrive.
- Draw upon over 30 years’ worth of first-hand experience, accumulated data, best practices, research reports, tools, frameworks, and other relevant materials — as and when they are relevant to your circumstances.
Adam will be your “second brain” and trusted advisor. Two heads are better than one, particularly when it comes to navigating organisational complexity, dynamic markets, unreasonable colleagues, and institutionalised resistance to change.
There is no ulterior motive behind the work Adam undertakes with you. He has no interest in “selling up”, expanding scope, or hunting for new biz-dev opportunities within your organisation. He does not work for, or report to, your senior leaders or management team.
Instead, Adam operates as a “private practice”. He works for you alone, in service of your objectives, and with your best interests underpinning the partnership. Together, you’ll build an environment that is conducive to trust given and trust granted, allowing you to hammer out robust strategies that will make you more effective and impactful in your role.
Some Organisations Adam has supported
ABOUT ADAM
From high-growth start-ups to Fortune 10 multinationals, Adam Cox enables Heads of Strategy, executives, and their teams. With 30+ years of experience working both in and on businesses, Adam’s advisory work has seen him partner one-on-one with over 650 CXO executives and enable more than 6,000 strategists to help shape careers, departments, and companies in over 80 countries across most sectors of the global economy.
You can read Adam’s full bio here.