Got a strategy but having trouble getting people to put their time and effort into implementing it?

See the great article / video here from McKinsey. One of the best I have seen for a long time. The bottom line: organizations that are free to reallocate resources (people and money) to rising star projects from dog projects have 4% p.a. higher returns.

This applies to not-for-profits as well, as the profits / returns to which this article refers translate into increased productivity in not-for-profits.

A long time ago the organization for which I worked brought in a new CEO to implement needed changes. Everyone said “yes” to the ideas, but carried on as normal. The CEO ended up creating the change by making himself the sole approver of any capital expenses over $8000. It was difficult for the organization to carry on as normal when they could not buy the tools to do this. It took three months for one person to change the strategy of a 25,000 person organization using this simple tool. He was busy signing (or rejecting) expenses for three months. It was time well spent.

Is the project that you have identified as the most important thing to do being done? If the reason for it not being done is that people are not working on it, then force the issue by reallocating resources to it from low priority projects. Go ahead, you can do it.