Strategy as a Daily Practice

As part of a strategic planning exercise for an all-boys charter school, I once facilitated a conversation with the school’s staff to collect their perspectives about the school’s strategy. 

Given what the organization does, staff members are much more likely to be deeply conversant in the language of teaching pedagogy, behavior interventions, and adolescent mental health than in the language of organizational strategy. Still, when prompted to think about the school’s future, the team reasoned through the strategy as well as any team of MBAs.

It was clear that the school’s strategic culture was not an accident. It was built by their daily practices. 

For example, the teaching staff meets for an hour to kick off each school day. In that meeting, they identify and discuss challenges they collectively face. But unlike teams in many organizations, these meetings aren’t filled with pontification. Instead, the meetings are about crafting solutions the team can implement that day! 

In strategy speak, this means they have an embedded cycle of test-and-learn. If the ideas work, they keep them going. If the ideas don’t work, the following day provides another opportunity to get it right.

That meeting routine also gives the team lots of reps providing effective feedback to each other and highlighting issues without playing the blame game. When I observed the meeting, the staff discussed a previous fight between two boys. The incident happened when a teacher briefly left a classroom unattended to help other students move to their next academic block. 

What was terrific about the conversation was that it quickly moved beyond that teacher’s mistake—it was acknowledged as an error and tabled. Instead, the staff dissected the broader structures that created the situation in which the teacher felt he had to leave the classroom. It became a discussion about everyone’s responsibility to adhere to the school schedule to ensure the students were in the right place at the right time. 

In other words, they had a culture of psychological safety and learning that enabled them to grow from mistakes. Of course, it was not the easiest experience for that teacher to have his mistake dissected by colleagues, but it was made easier because it was part of a routine. It is what the team does, and they would do it for everyone’s mistakes. 

Achieving that culture is facilitated by the fact that the morning meeting ends with reaffirming everyone’s place on the team. They hold hands and confirm that everyone is valued and that they’re on a joint mission. Because psychological safety is deeply rooted in our need to feel a part of the tribe, this is a powerful routine. They can have healthy debates because the debate will not result in anyone’s excommunication from the group.

Another reason the staff could effectively engage in strategy was that they talk to the “customers”—students and parents—daily. Their understanding of what’s working, what’s not, and what else the customer needs is direct—not filtered, averaged, and sanitized in a report. Everyone knows it immediately when two kids get in a scuffle, or a kid has a breakthrough.

So, when the group was asked to assess the fundamental drivers of results, everyone had a reasoned answer. And because they were constantly conversing, their answers about the strategy were aligned.

After the session ended, I told the CEO, “This is exactly what every team needs to do if they want to be strategic.”