Clarity is the difference between strategy that moves and strategy that stalls. If your team doesn’t “get” the strategy, you have no chance of executing it. Yet, clarity doesn’t happen by accident. It requires discipline: cutting through ambiguity, prioritizing what matters most, and ensuring that every person understands not just the what, but the why behind the strategy.

Simon Sinek famously calls on us to “start with why.” But for strategy to truly stick, we also need to explain “why me?”

People commit when they see how their work matters—when the strategy doesn’t just make sense, but feels personal. That’s when execution takes off.

And behavioral science backs this up.

Every organization wrestles with the challenge of implementing new strategies while keeping the current business running. Teams are already fully engaged in their “day jobs”—what’s often referred to as business as usual (BAU) or run-the-business (RTB) work. This tension between sustaining current operations and pursuing strategic change is one of the most common pitfalls in execution.

While it’s essential to continue delivering results for the existing business, the truth is the status quo isn’t enough. If it were, we wouldn’t need a new strategy. Something isn’t working—whether it’s a current problem or an emerging challenge—and change is necessary. But change doesn’t magically happen in the margins of an already packed calendar. To succeed, we have to intentionally make room for it.

Communicating effectively is deceptively hard.

Think about it. Most of us struggle to communicate perfectly with our significant others—even after years together. If we can’t nail it at home, with people we know intimately, what hope do we have in a workplace filled with competing priorities, shifting dynamics, and far less emotional investment?

The truth is, good communication doesn’t happen by accident.

It takes intention. Structure. Practice.

When executing strategies, communication isn’t a “nice to have.” It’s the difference between success and chaos—or worse, apathy. Yet, in my experience, too many leaders treat communication as an afterthought, assuming a single email, presentation, or town hall will do the job.

It starts small. A missed deadline. A short-tempered reply in a meeting. A high-performer who suddenly seems distracted and disengaged.

Then, before you realize it, the signs pile up. Turnover increases. Projects slow down. Execution starts to feel like a grind instead of a focused push toward a goal. You can’t put your finger on exactly what changed, but something is different. Your team is running on fumes.

Stress is one of the most underestimated threats to execution. Left unmanaged, it erodes motivation, fractures teams, and derails even the most well-planned strategies. And yet, many leaders don’t see the damage until it’s too late.

No system is immune to stress. Even in the best-run organizations, the pressure of execution can push teams to their limits. That’s why, as coaches, we need to go beyond just setting up the right conditions—we need to actively manage stress on a daily basis, just as we would any other obstacle to execution.

Dr. Jon Ashton, founder of Strata Intel, has spent years studying the interplay between organizational stress and execution capacity. His company measures stress dynamics within organizations using validated, real-time assessments. Unlike traditional surveys that rely on self-reported data, Strata Intel pinpoints where stress exists and correlates it directly with execution performance.

Great communication isn’t a one-time event. It’s a process—a rhythm—that unfolds over time. Messages need to be reinforced, adapted, and repeated to stick. Leaders who miss this risk leaving their teams confused, unmotivated, and misaligned with the strategy.

In fact, the most common communication mistake leaders make is saying too little.

A study published in the Academy of Management Journal found that leaders are 10 times more likely to be criticized for under-communicating than over-communicating. Employees consistently report that their leaders don’t provide enough relevant information to meet their needs. What’s more, leaders who under-communicate are often perceived as less empathetic, less credible, and less effective. 

Simply put: When in doubt, say it again.

When teams and leaders fully commit—when there’s no mental “escape hatch” of half-hearted support—they unlock a different level of focus, resilience, and momentum. This doesn’t mean blind loyalty or ignoring challenges. It means choosing a direction, aligning behind it, and moving forward with conviction.

And commitment has real, tangible benefits. Research shows that when leaders and teams fully commit to a strategic direction, they gain several advantages that boost execution: greater focus, stronger team cohesion, and increased resilience in the face of challenges.

When teams commit to a strategy, even with reservations, they experience powerful effects that strengthen execution. Focus improves, collaboration deepens, and momentum builds—driving both performance and team cohesion.

Accountability is the glue that holds coordinated efforts together. 

When multiple teams and individuals are working toward a shared strategic goal, accountability is a magical force that keeps everything aligned and moving forward. Without it, even our best plans can unravel into missed deadlines, finger-pointing, and confusion about who is responsible for what. 

Accountability is often thought of as something that flows from the top down—a manager setting goals, checking progress, and ensuring results. But in reality, the most effective accountability happens between peers. When teams hold each other accountable, work moves faster, problems are solved more collaboratively, and people are more motivated to deliver.

Accountability, in this sense, isn’t about oversight—it’s about commitment. It’s what ensures that when one person completes their piece of the puzzle, the next person is ready to pick it up and keep going.

When it comes to early communication about change, getting the message right is critical. Change inherently stirs emotions—uncertainty, excitement, fear, and hope. Our message must address these emotions head-on, guiding our audience from resistance to acceptance. 

One of the most critical steps is clearly explaining the Why behind it. Why is change necessary? Why now? Why is this the right path? Without a compelling and well-articulated “Why,” even the best strategies will face resistance.

Over the years, I’ve developed a framework I call “Hook / Scare / Comfort / Inspire” to craft a message that answers these questions. It connects the logic of the change to the emotions of the people who will execute it.

When Neil Armstrong set foot on the moon in 1969, it wasn’t just the result of a lofty idea shouted from the rooftops. It was the culmination of a meticulously connected network of goals that guided every team and individual.[1] NASA’s mission—“land a man on the moon and return him safely to Earth”—was audacious, but it succeeded because it cascaded into precise objectives at every level. By breaking the impossible into achievable steps, NASA turned an aspirational vision into a coordinated effort that worked.

Every organization needs goals that do the same. Effective goals take strategy out of the abstract and turn it into meaningful, actionable work. When properly aligned, goals ensure every individual knows how their contributions matter.

But too often, organizations treat goal-setting as an HR-driven exercise focused on annual performance reviews. If your goals are primarily driven by HR, your strategy is probably doomed. This isn’t a knock on HR—it’s about understanding that goal-setting must be at the core of strategic execution, not just a tool for annual evaluations.

When goals are deeply tied to strategy, they can transform execution. A quality goal-setting process may produce useful performance data, but its real purpose is to bring clarity and motivation to the strategy, making it tangible and engaging for every individual involved.

The most effective framework for achieving this connection, in my experience, is OKRs—Objectives and Key Results.

Reduce, reuse, recycle”is a rallying cry for sustaining our planet’s precious resources. Guess what? We can apply that same mantra to sustain our own organizational precious resources. The limited resources at stake are time, money, and people. By adopting these principles, we can turn scarcity into opportunity, creating leaner, more focused, and more effective teams who have the capacity to execute our new strategies.

We’re naturally wired to believe that adding more is the solution—more resources, more tools, more tasks…more complexity. Yet, as research shows, this instinct for addition can bog us down, leading to diminishing returns. 

We've all heard experts say, "Get the right people in the room" when it comes to building a strategy. But what does that even mean? Vague advice like this isn’t helpful unless we dig deeper. Who are these people, why do they matter, and how do we leverage their insights effectively? Without clarity on this, we risk missing essential voices or creating a strategy that lacks focus.

So, what does it mean to get the right people in the room? Here are three key objectives:

Failing to prioritize well is one of the greatest disservices leaders can do to their teams. But prioritizing effectively is also one of the hardest things to do. 

Prioritization is the bridge between clarity and capacity. Without a clear focus from leaders, teams drift, resources are wasted, and strategic goals slip through the cracks.

Why Stack Ranking Matters

To effectively allocate resources, you have to do more than identify a list of important initiatives—you need to stack rank them. This means putting your initiatives, projects, or tasks in a clear order of importance where there is only one #1, one #2, and so on. Regardless of any specific methodology you use to help determine importance—whether it’s impact assessments, ROI models, timeline sequencing, or other sophisticated approaches—stack ranking remains critical. It ensures that your team knows exactly where to focus their energy, empowers them to make decisions, and aligns their efforts without constant guidance.

Convenience. We value it more than I think we sometimes realize. We’re willing to pay more for it, and we’re willing to sacrifice quality in exchange for it. So it stands to reason that delivering convenience for our customers can lead to a pretty profitable equation for retailers.

The threshold for inconvenience continues to get ever lower. We often complain about how many clicks it takes to get to what we’re looking for on a web page. Think about that for a moment. The energy required to cause our index fingers to press a button too many times is irritating. Some might say it’s not the energy, it’s the time. OK, fair enough. Then the “waste of time” threshold starts kicking in when we are forced to wait three to four seconds for a page to load. We’re busy! We haven’t got that kind of time to waste!

But this post isn’t a social commentary. It’s about recognizing an opportunity to serve customers and grow our businesses.

So, how can we focus our businesses on the convenience opportunity?

When it comes to motivating teams to execute a strategy, financial incentives like bonuses, commissions, and stock options often take center stage. While these rewards are effective, they don’t tell the full story. One of the most powerful, yet often overlooked, motivators in the workplace is social incentives. Recognition, accountability, and the need to belong frequently prove just as effective—if not more—than financial rewards in driving engagement and performance.

Monetary rewards alone rarely keep people motivated day in and day out. What truly drives many of us is a sense of purpose, recognition from our peers, and a personal connection to the work we do. Almost all of us want to feel like we’re part of something bigger and that our contributions matter. In fact, neuroscience shows that when we receive recognition, the brain’s reward centers light up in much the same way as when we receive financial compensation. This means social incentives are wired into us, deeply influencing our behavior at work.

Saying “No” is hard, especially if you’re an optimist like me. It can feel awkward, even risky. Saying “Yes,” on the other hand, feels great—it’s productive, optimistic, full of possibility. So it’s tempting to say “Yes” to everything that seems promising. But here’s the paradox: saying “Yes” to too many things often overwhelms your team, scattering their focus and preventing them from dedicating their best efforts to what truly matters.

Over the years, I’ve discovered that the most powerful tool for success isn’t saying “Yes”—it’s learning to say “No.” For leaders, this is one of the most essential skills to master if you want to maintain focus and drive meaningful results.

I’ve found a simple trick that makes it easier to say “No”

Let’s face it: nobody likes constraints at first. We all want freedom—more resources, more budget, more tools. But here’s the twist: constraints are actually our friend. Knowing what you can’t do helps you laser-focus on what you can do. Instead of chasing every possibility, you zero in on what really matters.

When a new strategy is on the table, there’s often a push for “more”—more money, more people, more time. But guess what? Adding more tends to makes things messier. More complexity, more decisions, more things to manage. The real magic happens when it’s clear that more isn’t coming. That’s when everyone rolls up their sleeves and figures out how to make it work with what they’ve got.