“I really want us to do things differently at the FTA. I have served in International Agencies and these big organizations for too long - I have seen many lofty strategic plans end up achieving very little in terms of tangible results, and I certainly do not want that to be my legacy at the FTA.” “Theophilus, you have to make this work! I understand the Strategy Execution Premium and what it takes to translate strategy to results. I want dashboards, SMART KPIs and the whole works - that is what leaders do - make sure that results happen”

With those marching orders from the Federal Transport Agency’s (FTA) new Director General, Hajia Asabe Gurin, Theophilus and Chiamaka of the Strategic Planning Unit (SPU) knew that things were certainly going to be different at the FTA going forward. The FTA is in its second year of its 4-year strategic plan and the newly appointed DG comes with a lot of experience in the Maritime and Aviation sectors globally, working at the International Maritime Organization in London as a Director of Operations and the Ports Authority of Canada as a Commissioner before her appointment by the President to oversee the much-needed reforms in the Transport sector in Nigeria.

“Ambrose, you need to come in and let’s have a chat. I remember your posts on working with Hilaad Plc to set-up their Office of Strategy Management on LinkedIn and I am thinking that we need that kind of support from you guys right away at the FTA” said Theo as he reached out to an old friend and colleague, Ambrose whose firm had some considerable expertise in Strategy Management.

The conversations with Ambrose and his team were an eye-opener - explaining things way better than the Consultants from one of the Big Four Firms that literally “dumped” the Strategy Plan with them in the previous year.

They reeled out a number of must-haves for an effective Office of Strategy Management (OSM) and besides having a team dedicated to Strategic Planning and having a Strategy document, FTA’s SPU certainly needed help in at least seven other areas. “The challenge now will be getting that help from Ambrose’s team without spending money on engaging a consultant who comes in sets up and then leaves us to stew like the last guys did” typed Theo in an instant message he sent to Chiamaka who was a few seats away from him during the meeting with Ambrose and his team.

“Sir, I think I know how we can proceed” chipped in Chiamaka who always seemed to come up with bright ideas. “Perhaps we can organize a three or four-day Strategy Implementation Workshop for the Strategic Planning Unit (SPU) with one Deputy Director (DD) each from the 7 Core Departments and one DD from HR and Risk Management each. Rather than just a teaching, Mr Ambrose can take us through all the stages of the OSM and we can work through all the templates and tools we need to execute. Part of the training could also include some hand-holding or mentoring after the training on-site where he can spend a few more days with us, in Post-Training Support. This way he doesn’t just come in and out as a Consultant, but he actually helps us to build strategic capabilities agency-wide that will stand the test of time”

“Brilliant as usual, simply brilliant” responded Theo.

After a few more weeks of pre-proposal meetings, presentations and the usual due process, the DG approved the program and Ambrose facilitated the workshop and began the implementation of the OSM in the manner that young Chiamaka had envisioned.

The take-aways from the workshop were unbelievable, and the most obvious was that in spite of having more than an average of two decades of professional experience spanning private, public and multilateral agencies, most of the Strategy Champions from the other Departments were pretty clueless about Strategy. By the time they were finished, the DD Technology Applications had a schematic and wire-frame for the Performance Dash-Board that was going to be used to track the KPIs; each department got a spread sheet for tracking the departmental and unit goals and assigned an in-house Projects Champion who was to work closely with SPU; the Finance Department got a template for activity-based budgeting to drive each of the strategy initiatives; the SPU was able to develop an interdepartmental dependency table so that Service-Level Agreements could be developed for the departments; and the HR Department created a framework for managing organizational change using the critically-acclaimed ADKAR framework.

“You guys have certainly made a lot of progress. We are going to get approval from the Secretary to the Government to change your Department from SPU to OSM - you are now a full-fledged Office of Strategy Management” remarked Hajia Gurin at the management meeting where the outcomes of the Workshop were presented and discussed.

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