[For my non-US readers: In the 1992 US presidential campaign, Governor Bill Clinton’s staff coined the phrase “it’s the economy, stupid” to remind themselves of what was most important to voters. It helped them to focus all of their efforts on the most essential determinant of their success.]

As a mentor once told me, all problems are people problems.

I was reading my local newspaper this morning. In the sports section, there was an article extolling the positive impact that the new pitching coach had had on the professional baseball team in my area. All of the pitchers were suddenly pitching better. More strikes, longer outings and more wins seem to be rule instead of the rare exception that we had enjoyed in past years. What had made the difference, the new pitching coach was asked. Was he emphasizing new techniques or trickier pitches? Maybe he was having all of the pitchers exercise more or differently than before? Perhaps it was not only the pitchers but the also the catchers (who usually decide what kind of pitch – fastball, curve, change up – that the pitcher throws) that had improved?

Yes, it was all of that he reported to the newspaper. Pitching is complicated but he was nevertheless finding ways to be more effective with the same group that had performed poorly the year before. But, and this was important, something more significant than technical improvements was going on.

Undergirding all of his approaches was the simple truth given to him many years ago by a veteran coach. That coach told him that “pitching was a people business.”

Everything revolved around working more effectively with and through people. The new coach had begun emphasizing relationships, communication, trust and all those other things that help people work together better for a common cause. Obvious, you might think, but it is a simple understanding often ignored by other coaches that are convinced that superior mechanics alone win games.

What about business strategy and competitive intelligence?

There are many analytical techniques that are employed to define, communicate and implement strategies. Competitive intelligence often involves models, data mining, sophisticated searches and investigative insights. All of this is necessary to accomplish the strategic tasks successfully.

However, techniques are necessary but not sufficient when they exclude the dimension of people.

Confession time. I have been involved in many strategy failures (and witnessed many more). Sometimes there is lack of intellectual clarity involved that causes the failures. And sometimes the failures have been caused by uncontrollable foreign elements (e.g., division sold off) in the environment. Most of the time, the failures can be traced to inadequate attention paid to the people involved in the decision or implementation process for the strategy.

Competitive intelligence failures are even more painful. After all, many an analyst will perform a beautiful analysis, present the results and then retire to their office to ponder why none of it was effective. The audience of senior managers is unaffected. Or, the very organizations that could benefit from the conclusions are visibly unmoved by what has been done. They don’t want the insights and could care less about the benefit that seems so clearly within their grasp.

Why do these things happen?

In my opinion it is because strategists and competitive intelligence professionals have become enamored with their tools and techniques to an extent that excludes consideration of the impact on people that matter to the success or failure of their effort.

The relationships that are required have not been established or nurtured, the requisite trust is not present and the everyday communication is neglected.

What would happen if we spent as much time learning about and applying good relationship skills as we did on web search techniques (or whatever favorite tools that you use)?

Here is what I think would happen.

1. We would do less (as measured by the quantity and size of reports). In place of that activity, we would be learning more about the jobs of our customers. What is hard for them? Where are they struggling? How do they make decisions?
2. We would judge our success differently. Instead of being output oriented (i.e., how many reports), we would ask how many problems we solved as reflected in the changes accepted or made by our customers. Did the work that we did make a significant difference for specific people?
3. We would get different training. Yes, we would still learn about all of the analytical tools. Added to that, though, we would learn better how to facilitate discussions, to listen to people and to help people through change.

“Life is a people business.”  The sooner and better that we grasp that fact, the more success that we are likely to have. Ignoring people means that we will have at best intermittent and limited successes.

What do you think about this? Has there been an instance when you ignored the people involved and experienced great success?