What was the latest fad chased or trend adopted by your business? Why did your management team jump on the bandwagon?

Every sound business initiative begins with a solid strategic plan. However, while most anyone can coble together a high level strategic plan, very few can author a strategy that can be successfully implemented. In order for your company to turn a trend or fad into a monetizing and/or value creating event you should develop a strategic plan that attempts to measure the idea against the following these elements:

1. The trend or fad should be in alignment with the overall vision and mission of the enterprise. And if the initiative doesn’t provide a unique competitive advantage it should at least bring you closer to an even playing field.
2. Any new project should preferably add value to existing initiatives, and if not, it should show a significant enough return on investment to justify the dilutive effect of not keeping the main thing the main thing. Put the idea through a risk/reward and cost/benefit analysis.
3. Whether the new initiative is intended for your organization, vendors, suppliers, partners or customers it must easy to use. Usability drives adoptability, and therefore it pays to keep things simple. Just because an idea sounds good doesn’t mean it is…You should endeavour to validate proof of concept based upon detailed, credible research.
4. Nothing is without risk, and when you think something is without risk that is when you’re most likely to end up in trouble. All initiatives should include detailed risk management provisions.
5. Adopting a trend or fad should be based upon solid business logic that drives corresponding financial engineering and modelling. Be careful of high level, pie-in-the-sky projections. Any new initiative should contain accountability provisions. Every task should be assigned and managed according to a plan and in the light of day.
6. A successful initiative cannot remain in a strategic planning state. It must be actionable through tactical implementation. Senior leadership must champion any new initiative. If someone at the C-suite level is against the new initiative it will likely die on the cutting floor.