So, What's The Plan?

In the world of entertainment, plotlines are held together with narratives. Where there is high drama, challenges and the need to take action, the same question is asked almost every time. "What's The Plan?".

Are you triggered yet? I suspect many people will already be looking for their safe space at this point.

What happens next is where the world of entertainment and real life start to diverge.

In the films, books and on TV, the protagonists carefully examine their challenges and start to craft an effective plan to overcome them. They are normally acutely aware of the urgency of their situation and want to proactively do something about it in order to avoid the disaster that they can see is coming their way.

They then create a complete, well-thought-out and comprehensive plan to deal with all of these challenges and associated variables so that they can achieve their clearly defined and stated goals.

These goals are normally ones that the audience can sympathise with;

• To achieve safety or survival.
• To prevent harm to themselves and the people they care for.
• To achieve a well-earned payday.
• To prevent a much larger disaster.
• To protect themselves and the people they care about.
• To correct (or prevent) an injustice that will result in depriving them of things that they care about.

For those readers currently hiding under their desks and kitchen tables, I'll say it again. They identify their challenges AND CRAFT A PLAN.

Think of films like Oceans 11, The Italian Job and just about any other piece of Hollywood heist drama and the plan is as much a star of the movie as any of the leading protagonists.

In many cases, the execution of the plan is meant to be thrilling to the audience with breathtaking moments of drama and feats of courage that are designed to elicit applause.

We marvel at the audacity of the on-screen heroes who are achieving spectacular results against overwhelming odds while the rest of us are sat watching from our comfortable seats.

If you're still reading without your fight or flight response demanding you find a dark, quiet corner to hide in, you may just be one of my favourite people. Don't forget to get in touch.

Business Typically Doesn't Follow the Hollywood Formula

When faced with a bunch of colleagues and subordinates asking "What's the Plan?", what do many leaders do instead?

I have been personally told by bosses that I have had the pleasure of working for "You don't need to know the plan".

As a senior manager or director in charge of a key team or business function (in my case this included Operations, Business Development, Sales, Revenue Creation and Training), I can tell you that they were very wrong.

I suspect that what they were actually trying to tell me was that despite being the leader of the entire business, they did not have a plan, just like the other Joker pictured above.

What Happens In a Vaccum Created By the Absence of a Plan?

Instead of a unifying plan, when a plan does not exist, you typically end up with team leaders, department heads and anyone with a sense of responsibility making up their own individual plans.

• Some of these will be based on what that particular individual believes will achieve the desired outcomes of the business.
• Other employees will create plans that deliver on their self-interest.
• Others still will conduct themselves in a way to create the least risk to themselves.

This kind of disparate effort and unpredictable output cannot be ideal for the business. It can result in damaging chaos and conflict within the business.

None of these plans will be created with the required level of information, resources or the kind of common purpose that you'd expect to lead an organisation with.

One or two of these individuals may get lucky and produce results that make a decent enough contribution to the organisation to offset the wasted time and money resulting from the un-led efforts of the rest of the workforce.

In organisations like this, these efforts are rarely recognised, as to do so would also expose the fact that they were working in a vacuum of leadership.

Rewards and awards may well go to those individuals that chose to follow their own self-interest and were savvy enough to suck up to the organisation's leaders as part of their strategy.

There are costs to not having plan that gets each member of the workforce doing their part to deliver the organisation's goals.

What Does This Question Actually Mean?

"What's The plan Boss?" should actually be music to a leader's ears. It should fill a leader's heart with joy and courage.

It's a good sign. Here are a few of the meanings:

"We're engaged and want to do something about this situation."

"We're right here with you, Just tell us what to do"

"We're worried. What are we going to do about it?"

"We can see this is clearly a problem. Let's solve it together"

"We're right behind you. Lead us."

"We care about how this will turn out and are ready to take the required action."

"We cannot afford to suffer the negative consequences that will come from failing to deal with this. You think so too, right?"

"We're ready to deal with this. Just tell us how."

"We believe in you. Tell us how we're going to achieve a good outcome."

So What Do Many Leaders Do With This Kind of Overt Support?

This approach does nothing to deal with your problems or approaching challenges. Ultimately this response will alienate the people that look to you for leadership.

If this ostrich was trying to ignore a heavy lorry heading directly towards it, can you see how this might not be the most effective tactic? What if this was a metaphor for the serious challenges your organisation is facing?

Many people depend on a business succeeding, so the ostrich manoeuvre can result in many people being hurt or negatively affected.

So What's the Lesson?

Be. More. Hollywood.

1. Be clear about your goals.
2. Clearly identify your challenges and how to overcome them to achieve your goals.
3. Identify your timescales and acknowledge the urgency of your situation.
4. Realise what will inevitably happen if you do nothing.
5. Create a comprehensive plan.
6. Communicate it clearly with your team.
7. Take decisive action and lead your team through the meticulous execution of the plan.
8. High Fives all round
9. Closing credits.

So What's Your Next Move?

Get in Touch

If you want to talk more about how to solve your business challenges with a great plan, and excellent support to execute your plan, then get in touch.

A coffee or lunch is always part of a good plan!

Send me a message to arrange a time for a chat.

Please leave a comment, share your own experience, like and share this article.

If you can name the films or tv shows that each of these memes is from, the coffees are on me.