Strategy vs. operations is the wrong dichotomy

A common framework in business writing is to refer to strategy and operations as a mutually-exclusive-collectively-exhaustive set of categories to describe what happens in an organization. Colloquially, the strategy side of the house "decides what to do", and the operations side of the house "does it". 

Plenty of words have been spent declaring one "more important" than the other, but what I don't often see is an articulation of something other than the two options. Stepping outside the strict business realm, I think the way the US military describes levels of warfare can provide a helpful way to view activities within a company.

In the military, the strategic level deals with broad objectives, like being in a given region for a given purpose. The tactical level is the "boots on the ground", or the "tip of the spear". The operational level connects the two by looking at things like: what kind of boots do you need? where on the ground do you need to be when? do you have the equipment you need? are your batteries charged? are you well fed? are you able to talk with each other? are you dressed for the weather?

In other words, the operational level enables the tactical level to achieve the objectives of the strategic level. 90% of our armed forces work at the operational level. If you think about the "tip of the spear", a spear tip only becomes a truly deadly weapon when it is attached to a shaft. The operational level is that shaft; providing heft, range, and support to the tip.

As the connector between strategy and tactics, the operational level needs to be able to both speak the language of strategy as well as understand the reality of the tactics. Strategic objectives need to be deepened via specific operational contexts, and key tactical details need to be surfaced in order to make better strategic decisions.

In a company, you might think about salespeople, engineers, customer service reps, and other front line employees as the tactical level. If they are to succeed in achieving the strategic objectives of their organization, they need operational support. Supervisors, middle managers, IT departments, finance departments, HR -- these are all examples of the ways organizations support their tactical level employees, even if they're not traditionally thought of as "operational" roles. From that view, the questions flow naturally. Does your operational level understand your strategic objectives? How are operational observations informing strategic decision making? How effective is our tactical level able to be? Is the tactical level effective in a way that supports our strategy?

We don't expect Soldiers to buy their own weapons and arrange their own ride to the fight, why would we expect other front-line actors to take on burdens that will hamper their efficacy?

People love processes!

The hard charging, results focused leader is a well worn business stereotype. Browse LinkedIn and you'll see professionals proclaim that they're "able to deliver", "goal oriented", or "focused on the bottom line". Expressions like "the end justifies the means", "a win is a win", or "any landing you can walk away from" also embody this belief that all that matters is what we end up with when the dust settles.

Combine that with what often seems like a general distaste for "process" and it's easy to see the allure in a results orientation. Moving from end-state to end-state with a measurement only for results achieved gives us an impression of concrete movement through an ambiguous world, like moving a game piece from square to square across a board.

A focus on results, however, flies in the face of so many human experiences that we crave. When playing a game, for instance, we don't want to just find out the score at the end -- we want to play the game. We want to exert our creative energies within a defined set of options in pursuit of an overarchingly understood goal.

Think about watching sports. Again, we don't just want the score at the end, we want to see how the teams got there. If we can't experience it for ourselves then we clamor for highlight reels and sports-writing, or even something so humble as a box-score. The baseball almost as old as the game itself and still just as useful for its ability to tell us how a game was played that led to the result we see in the score.

Our natural love for processes becomes even more evident in our story-telling mediums. We know in books and movies that good will triumph, leading couples will come together, and ne'er-do-wells will be put in their place. And yet we go to see the how of it all again and again. We bemoan plot holes, savor plot twists that expertly breakdown and reassemble our understanding of events, and we even go so far as to warn others when we might reveal key parts (spoiler alert!).

And yet when we put our same human selves in business settings, we often seem to lose interest in the how of the work, until the how becomes critical. Headline scandals at places like Volkswagen and Wells Fargo shock us not for the results they achieve, but for the processes by which they achieve those results. 

I think some of the natural love for processes is beginning to spread in the workplace. Witness the rise of storytelling training for big corporations, emphases on "narratives", the need for brands to have "stories" to connect with customers, etc. When done well these approaches can be transformative because of the deep-seated process-loving kernel in all of us; when not done well they push away customers repulsed by a lack of authenticity. 

If you want to see the world around you more clearly, pay attention to the processes by which you get the results you see. If it's not a compelling story for you, figure out a different way to assemble the pieces of the narrative and you'll unlock not only depths of energy within yourself, but also a well of connections with those around you.