Achieving sustainable success

Our framework for achieving success with creative services programs.

1. READY — envision success

• A. Determine who defines success (the person with authority, responsibility, and accountability). You? Someone else?
• B. Decide, together, what you want to accomplish (goals and objectives).
• C. Confirm your resources (staff, contractors, budget, volunteers).
• D. Brainstorm the many possible paths that can lead toward your goals.

2. STEADY — focus on success

• A. Determine the optimal path (strategy) for this phase based on the match between goal and resources.
• B. Plan how you will implement that optimal strategy (plan of action).

3. GO — commit to success

• A. Commit to the plan of action.
• B. Do the work (tactics) and have fun.
• C. Evaluate the work against the definition of success.

4. REPEAT — integrate success

• A. You may pass “go” and collect kudos.
• B. Remember this is a journey that never ends.
• C. Integrate what you’ve learned.
• D. Go back to step 1.

Related reports

• Creative leadership
• Measuring outcomes
• Developing a Web strategy

Further reading

• A case for strategic thinking (National Association of Independent Schools) — “Strategy… is less a fixed design than a flexible learning process that, ultimately, produces the “integrated perspective” … that is compelling but not rigid.“
• An overview of systems thinking (Wikipedia) — “Systems thinking is a framework that is based on the belief that the component parts of a system can best be understood in the context of relationships with each other and with other systems, rather than in isolation.“
• Leadership through systems intelligence (Wikipedia) — The effective leader “accepts that the world consists of a complex web of interacting relationships, to which everyone contributes; engages the holistic feedback mechanism of the environment; [and] interacts with the environment in a way that makes minor corrections in the systems, generating huge effects due to the nonlinear dynamics of the system.”

• Source (used with permission)