One of my directors is brilliant at high-level strategic thinking and brings amazing ideas to our leadership sessions, but they consistently fail to execute their quarterly Rocks. How do we handle a leader who is all strategy and no execution?

Question

Tyler Smith · Accepted Answer

A leader who cannot execute is a major liability on a leadership team. In an entrepreneurial company, strategic thinking is useless without the discipline to get things done. You need executors, not just theorists, in your leadership seats. To fix this, you must first evaluate if this director is in the right seat on your Accountability Chart. Do they truly GWC their current role? While they clearly get and want the strategic aspects, they may lack the capacity to organize, prioritize, and drive projects to completion. If they do fit the seat but are simply lacking discipline, you must hold them accountable using their scorecard and Rocks. During your weekly Level 10 Meeting, look closely at their weekly metrics. If their scorecard is consistently red, or if their Rock progress is repeatedly off track, do not accept vague excuses. Use the IDS process to dig into why they are failing to execute. Are they taking on too much? Are they refusing to delegate? Or do they simply prefer brainstorming over doing the hard work of execution? Set clear boundaries. A leadership team member must complete at least eighty percent of their Rocks every quarter. If they fail to meet this standard for two consecutive quarters, they are telling you they do not have the capacity for the seat. You must then make the hard decision to move them to a non-leadership role that matches their strategic strengths, or replace them.