If you want to get something done, a strategic plan is the best way to do it, start to finish. In Part 1, we talked about the benefits of strategic planning. Then, in Part 2, we went over step by step how to write out your strategic plan.

Now comes the difficult part. It’s time to roll up your sleeves and get busy. A strategic plan will only work if you do. We’ve spent a lot of time on the start of a strategic plan. If you actually want to finish it, here’s where the rubber meets the road.

So many ideas have good starts but fail to finish. Why is that? How can such great ideas die on the vine? It all comes down to being disciplined about the execution. It’s really about math. What’s 100 times 0? Zero. But 50 times 2 is 100. Do you get the picture? Maybe not.

A great idea without execution is worthless. It’s like 100 times 0. You can have the best idea in the world, but if you don’t follow through with action, nothing will happen. But take a good idea, or even an average idea, and multiply it with execution, and you can get great results. That’s exactly what I want to see for each of you and your churches.

Avoiding the Plateau

Sometimes ideas die even with deliberate execution. One reason is that they hit what entrepreneur Scott Belsky calls the “project plateau.” After the initial birth of an idea, there’s often a flurry of activity. You plan meetings, brainstorm the topic, get people on board, and then eventually get approval.

Now you are left with doing the hard work. And that’s a lot less fun than seeing the idea off the ground.

Project plateau happens when we put more value on coming up with great ideas than seeing good ideas to their end. There are really two phases in strategic planning. The first is coming up with the concept. Most people call this stage “ideation.” It involves a lot of creativity and fun. It happens around mugs of coffee, whiteboards and couches.

But once you leave the creativity session and move into the real world, project plateau will happen if you’re not careful. If you aren’t well organized and disciplined, you’ll slip into a plateaued state quickly and easily. Without leadership capacity and a commitment to leverage your connections, you’ll get trapped on the plateau.

We need to be realistic about the forces working against our strategic plan. There are multiple things working against every great idea. The biggest hurdle is time. If your team members are not disciplined about their schedules and completing tasks, you’ll never see that idea get off the ground.

But there are other factors at play, too — for instance, the daily demand of your job, other work that needs to be completed, outside responsibilities and individual fulfillment. Good leaders will help their teams navigate all these issues to keep plans from plateauing.

Shifting From Dream to Work

It’s great to dream big. But unless you take that dream and put work into it, it’s just a dream. The next phase, execution, is the most important part. We can all dream big, but not all of us can actually follow through.

A great idea without execution is worthless.

Take Elon Musk, for instance. How many of us dreamed of one day flying rockets into outer space? But here’s someone who has actually made that happen, with no help from NASA. He’s been able to do that because he has moved from ideation to execution throughout his life.

Teach your team to shift from a dream-centered mindset to a work-related one. This isn’t about stifling creativity. On the contrary, real creativity takes work. If your team can make it through the planning stage with a high level of enthusiasm, then they should be willing to push through the execution stage.

Any idea worth having is worth working hard for. If you really value that idea, then you’ll want to put in the effort to see it come to fruition. But you’ll need some tools to do that.

Getting It Done

Here’s what it takes to create an atmosphere of disciplined execution. First of all, focus on productivity. That doesn’t mean you work efficiently. It’s not about how much you can do in the span of an hour or two. It’s about doing work that is high impact. Productivity means that your work has a measured result. But it also means staying on tasks that are important.

Next, focus on the importance of action steps. That means each time you meet about your strategic plan, you should make sure to assign tasks for people to accomplish to keep the ball moving down the field. If you don’t assign it, don’t expect it to get done. And if you don’t write it down, don’t expect it to get assigned.

Don’t assume that tasks will be completed. Be intentional about matching each step with the person responsible.

This is how you build an action-oriented culture. Writing out action steps puts everyone on notice that they have a larger responsibility to the team and the vision. At the end of each meeting, go around the room and have people write out the action steps. You’ll capture everything that needs to be done. Then assign each step in writing. It’s as simple as that.

Measure your meetings not by the amount of information you hand out, but by the number of action steps you capture.

Strategic planning can help you not only accomplish a goal but to set a better culture in your church as well. As you work together with disciplined execution, you’re reinforcing the importance of action-oriented teamwork.

You’re letting each person see how their contributions fit into the whole. You’re also teaching them the organizational strength of individual responsibility. And those are incredibly valuable lessons.

Don’t wait to start using disciplined execution. Try out some of these tools in your next staff meeting. And if you’ve already started your strategic planning, make sure your team is on board. Setting action steps is the best way to get you over any project plateau.