$1 Million Wasted Every 20 Seconds: 5 Proven Practices to Avoid Business Waste

According to a survey conducted by Project Management Institute (PMI), organizations worldwide are losing nearly 10% of every dollar due to poor execution of business strategy, resulting in a staggering waste of $1 million every 20 seconds. This equates to an annual loss of approximately $2 trillion. Get five critical factors that can help organizations drive performance by executing strategies more effectively in this article.

The survey reveals that, on average, organizations waste 9.9% of their budget due to underperforming projects. Shockingly, one in three projects fails to meet its goals, 43% exceeds the budget, and almost half (48%) falls behind schedule. Surprisingly, despite these statistics, 85% of executive leaders believe their organizations are effective in delivering strategic projects. This disconnection leads to massive financial losses with broader macro-economic implications.

Katarina Bennich, CMO at Howwe Technologies, explains, “Organizations often overlook the vital link between strategy design and its successful execution. Effective leadership supported by modern, digital tools that transform the strategy into actionable goals and activities are the key drivers behind successful strategy execution, significantly impacting the bottom line.”

Five critical factors that can help organizations drive performance by executing strategies more effectively

1. Alignment by Executive Leadership & Engagement: Active involvement of executive champions creating alignment and clarity around the strategic goals are top drivers of initiatives meeting their business goals. However, strategic initiatives often lack active executive sponsors driving alignment and engagement, emphasizing the need for increased engagement from organizational leaders.
2. Prioritization of Initiatives: Far too many organizations struggle with prioritizing the most important strategic initiatives and goals in their strategy and end up being cluttered with operational work. C-Suite executives must support their organization by prioritizing and doing so based on financial potential in order to enable the full potential of the organization and ensure the right focus is in place to deliver desired outcomes.
3. Optimize Strategy Implementation Investment: Many organizations prioritize developing strategy over execution. There is a disconnect between executive leaders and project managers regarding funding for strategy implementation and there is a need for better alignment and investment focus to achieve strategic objectives.
4. Embrace Agile Methodologies: With the increasing pace of innovation and disruption, organizations must leverage an agile approach to strategy execution. Digital transformation has significantly impacted the work of most. By following a proactive Way of Working organizations can successfully deliver against their strategic goals.
5. Cultivate Organizational Agility: While many organizations report improved agility in the past years, only a fraction have high overall organizational agility. Learn more about business agility in this short video. To thrive in today’s business environment, organizations must prioritize creating a culture receptive to change. Without a digital application to support fast re-alignment, driving through change can take months or even years. WIth a digital application like Howwe, it takes two weeks.

Looking ahead, organizations that effectively leverage disruption and maintain agility will not only drive financial gains but also gain a competitive advantage. Join us in implementing these proven practices to avoid waste and enhance business success.

Blog post written by Katarina Bennich