Budget Season Foundations Part 3:  Gain cross-functional alignment to achieve an “Actionable” initiative

Budget Season Foundations Part 3:  Gain cross-functional alignment to achieve an “Actionable” initiative.

In the first two posts on Budget Season, we explored identifying a budget goal for the upcoming year (in this example, an illustrative 7% revenue growth goal), and a “bottom’s up” approach to developing 3-5 “big ideas” that can help deliver your budgeted revenue growth.

In part three of this series, we tackle the NEED to engage the cross-functional teams that will be impacted by your “big idea”.   Why, you might ask?   Well, there are several reasons, but today we will explore the big three in my book.

1.       You need to understand if your big idea is ACTIONABLE.

Actionable is one of the most important words in my vocabulary.   Too often in my career I observed great, amazing ideas (one or two of my own) on a white board (or Powerpoint deck) that missed one key point:   the teams that serve the customers day-in and day-out were incapable of executing the idea.   Ideas were modeled and approved, and as soon as they were put into market, they flopped.    

This is not to say the big idea was not exactly what the business needed.   More times than not, the outcome was that the big idea could not be executed TODAY, and the timing simply was not right (typically as other foundational work was required to get the pieces in place to execute the big idea successfully).

Taking this first step-connecting with your implementation teams to validate the feasibility of execution- is a must-have before you start pitching your big idea to executive leaders.  

2.      You need to identify if your big idea is in direct conflict to existing policies or procedures within your larger organization.

Big ideas (by definition) bring new opportunities and challenges into your business operating model.   From my experience, big ideas trigger some element of change management that is required within your business in order to make your big idea a success.   Will each of your big ideas add some element of change management to your operating model?  Most likely.  

And guess what, change management is hard. 

I experienced this firsthand in my career.    I developed and gained approval for a specific sales strategy that generated churn reduction and downstream revenue growth.    My only problem: my strategy was not aligned with the commission structure of the team executing the strategy.  The outcome?   My organization did not realize the expected churn improvement until approximately 12 months later than expected.   This was a humbling learning experience considering the revenue improvement we expected to generate from this strategy was delayed, and other interim strategies were required to fill the revenue gap expected.

Learn from me:   be proactive with your big ideas.  By engaging your implementation teams to identify any change management requirements, you can effectively identify any existing conflicts to your big idea, address them proactively with your key constituents, and build a realistic timeline for implementation (and ultimately revenue generation).  

3.      Gain alignment with other teams on your big idea and gain positive momentum for its approval.

As already discussed, your big idea will likely trigger change management across your organization in order to achieve a successful execution.  And while change management is hard, your big idea has the chance to improve an existing broken process or policy that is impacting other teams in your organization.  

When you engage other teams, be an active listener and seek opportunities where your big idea can help improve your implementation team’s day-to-day jobs.   The key here is to NOT turn this discussion into a sales pitch, but to collectively find out if your big idea can address an existing pain-point within their team.   Through this approach, you have the opportunity to not only gain alignment on your big idea, but also receive valuable feedback that can improve it as well.   

But what is the “big win” opportunity here?   The power of numbers around a common cause or opportunity. 

When you pitch your big idea, your executive team will likely “ask around” to other teams to see if your big idea will float.   The more people that know about your big idea (and even better agree with the concept) will help with your momentum.        

Does this guarantee a “yes” to your big idea?   Not necessarily, but it does lay a firm foundation when you do get to the negotiation table.