Book review: New book explores the way to implement business strategy

A titanic mistake by many of today's business leaders is to focus mostly on crafting strategy and not enough on its implementation.

This has led to many leaders failing too frequently on the delivery of their strategy promises to shareholders.

The current markets have placed even greater pressure on leaders to execute the strategy right the first time, and leaders want to know today what they must do differently. Implementation can no longer be delegated.

In Beyond Strategy: The Leader's Role in Successful Implementation, the follow-up to the best-selling Bricks to Bridges: Make Your Strategy Come Alive, author Robin Speculand, a thought leader in the field, turns his attention from how to implement strategy to what leaders must do differently.

Strategy implementation is a new field, and the genesis was the realization that most strategy implementations fall through.

Speculand is founder and CEO of Singapore-based Bridges Business Consultancy International, a global business consulting firm specializing in strategy implementation.

Implementation never goes according to plan, and leaders must oversee and direct the implementation, according to Speculand.

Leaders must alter not only their attitude, but also their approach and actions. After all, it is the implementation that delivers the revenue, not the strategy.

This book, one of the first to globally address a leader's responsibility in execution, describes a framework for implementing strategy and identifies the specific actions leaders must take.

It is a comprehensive, yet succinct handbook, and also action-oriented for leaders with a strategy to implement.

(China Daily 11/09/2009 page5)