Strategy Is a Feedback Loop, Not a Finish Line
"Plans are worthless, but planning is everything." – Dwight D. Eisenhower
We spend a lot of time developing strategy. We assess where we are, define priorities, build workplans, identify measures, and determine who will do what. Eventually, the plan is approved and the work begins. As I’ve written before, execution is where leadership becomes real. Then reality gets a vote.
An initiative takes longer than expected. Faculty respond differently than anticipated. A new process works well in one area but struggles in another. An assumption that seemed reasonable during planning doesn’t quite hold up once the work begins.
None of this necessarily means the strategy was wrong. It means execution is teaching us something we couldn’t fully know when we created the plan.
Key Idea: Strategy doesn’t end when the plan is approved or execution begins. Effective leaders create a feedback loop between action, evidence, learning, and adaptation so that what they learn through execution informs what happens next.
Here are three ways leaders can turn execution into strategic learning:
1. Compare: What Did We Expect and What Actually Happened?
Key Idea: Execution gives us information the original plan could not. Every strategic choice carries assumptions. We expect people to respond in certain ways. We assume particular resources will be sufficient. We anticipate that one action will lead to another. Some assumptions prove correct. Others don’t.
The problem isn’t that our plans contain assumptions. They must. The problem occurs when we become so focused on executing the plan that we stop noticing what the experience is teaching us.
Try This: Choose one important initiative and ask…
What did we expect to happen by this point?
What has actually happened?
Where are the two aligned?
Where is there a meaningful difference?
What surprised us?
The goal is to notice whether a difference exists.
Example:
A college redesigns part of its curriculum to increase integration and active learning. Faculty development is completed, courses launch on schedule, and new learning activities are implemented. Yet students report seeing strong connections across disciplines in some courses but not others. Some faculty teams adapt quickly while others struggle with the coordination required. The plan is being implemented but execution is also generating information that wasn’t available when the plan was developed.
2. Question: What Is the Experience Teaching Us?
Key Idea: Sometimes feedback tells us to improve execution. Sometimes it tells us to reconsider an assumption underneath it. When something doesn’t unfold as expected, our first instinct may be to fix the execution. Provide more training. Clarify expectations. Add resources. Improve communication. Those may be exactly the right responses. But not always.
Research on organizational learning distinguishes between correcting an action and questioning the assumptions or policies behind it. That distinction matters for leaders. If we only ask, How can we execute the plan better?, we may miss the more important question: What if the experience is telling us something about the plan itself?
Try This: When expectations and experience don’t align, ask…
Is this primarily an execution problem?
What assumptions did we make when we developed the plan?
Which of those assumptions does the evidence support?
Which one might deserve another look?
What are we learning?
Am I trying to learn from what happened or prove that our original decision was right?
Example:
The curriculum team might initially conclude that faculty need additional development. That could be true. But further discussion reveals that the greatest difficulty occurs when multiple courses require coordination across faculty teams with very different workloads and processes. The issue may not simply be whether faculty know how to implement the change. The experience may be revealing an assumption about organizational capacity that needs to be reconsidered.
3. Apply: What Will We Do Differently Because of What We Learned?
Key Idea: The feedback loop isn’t complete until learning influences what happens next. Reflection is useful. Discussion is useful. After-action reviews are useful. But if the insight never changes a decision, behavior, process, or assumption, the organization may have reflected without actually learning.
Importantly, learning doesn’t always mean changing direction. Sometimes the evidence increases confidence that the strategy is sound. The next move may be to stay the course. Other times, leaders may need to strengthen execution, test an assumption, or adjust the approach. The important question is whether what we learned influences what happens next.
Try This: Conduct a Strategic Learning Pause
Choose one significant initiative underway and complete four statements:
WE EXPECTED: When we started, we believed…
WE OBSERVED: What actually happened was…
WE LEARNED: This may tell us…
WE WILL: Because of that learning, our next step is…
Then ask: What assumption are we making that might no longer deserve to go unchallenged?
Final Thoughts:
A strategic choice gives us direction, but it can’t anticipate everything we will encounter along the way. Execution brings the plan into contact with people, culture, systems, capacity, and changing circumstances. This is where some of the most valuable learning occurs. The leadership challenge is to create a feedback loop that allows experience to make the strategy stronger. Learning helps us decide what happens next.
Next Steps to Strengthen Your Strategy:
Is your organization executing its strategy but struggling to translate experience into better decisions? EduLead-Rx works with academic pharmacy leaders to strengthen strategic leadership, turn organizational learning into informed action, and move important priorities toward next-level results.
#AcademicPharmacy #PharmacyLeadership #EduLeadRx #LeadershipDevelopment #StrategicLeadership #OrganizationalLearning #Coaching