Strategy Doesn’t Fail in the Boardroom. It Fails in Translation.
- Gilma Mills
- 15 hours ago
- 3 min read
Key Takeaways
Strategy doesn’t fail at the top. It fails when intent isn’t translated into executable priorities.
Ambiguity, not misalignment, is what drives inconsistent execution and wasted effort.
Without clear decisions, ownership, and cadence, teams execute different versions of the same strategy.
Main Concept
Most mid-market leaders don’t struggle to set strategy.
They struggle to get it to land.
The intent is clear at the top.
Somewhere in the middle, meaning blurs.
At the edges, execution drifts.
By the time results show up, the strategy hasn’t failed because it was wrong.
It failed because it was never translated into something teams could actually execute.
The Strategy Translation Gap
In growing organizations, strategy often lives in:
Decks
Narratives
Annual plans
Leadership language
Execution lives somewhere else entirely.
When translation is weak, teams are left to interpret:
What matters most
What can wait
What “good” actually looks like
That’s not empowerment.
That’s ambiguity.
And ambiguity is expensive.
What Strategy Breakdown Looks Like on the Ground
When strategy isn’t translated into execution, it shows up as:
Teams aligned on goals, misaligned on priorities
Leaders approving work that technically fits — but misses the point
Inconsistent execution across markets or functions
Progress reports that sound positive but feel off
Everyone believes they’re executing the strategy.
They’re just executing different versions of it.
Why Translation Is Harder in the Mid-Market
Mid-market companies sit in a dangerous middle:
Too big for informal alignment
Too small for heavy governance
Growing faster than operating models mature
Leadership assumes clarity because they are clear, but clarity doesn’t scale on intent alone. It scales through designed translation.
What I Learned Translating Strategy at Scale
In one large transformation, the strategy was sound. The ambition was clear. The leadership alignment was strong.
But the execution environment spanned:
Multiple markets
Multiple functions
Thousands of employees
Deeply embedded local behaviors
The risk wasn’t resistance. It was an interpretation.
So the work wasn’t to restate the strategy.
It was to translate it into execution guardrails.
What Translation Actually Required
Strategy became executable only when it was broken into:
Clear decisions, not just direction
Explicit tradeoffs, not assumptions
Non-negotiables versus local flex
A shared cadence for review and adjustment
Once teams knew:
What could change
What couldn’t
And who owned decisions
Execution snapped into place. Not perfectly, but consistently.
Why This Is a Productivity Issue (Too)
When strategy isn’t translated:
Teams redo work
Leaders revisit decisions
Progress slows without anyone stopping
That’s why strategy translation isn’t a communications exercise. It’s an execution discipline.
Productivity doesn’t improve until translation does.
The Pattern I See Repeatedly
Strategy fails when leaders assume:
“If we say it clearly enough, it will execute.”
It won’t.
Execution requires:
Structure
Context
Decision rights
Rhythm
Without those, strategy becomes a suggestion.
This Is Spoke 2
Productivity leakage (Spoke 1) and strategy breakdown (Spoke 2) are symptoms of the same issue.
When execution isn’t designed:
Work multiplies
Meaning fragments
Follow-through erodes
The Hub remains unchanged:
Mid-market companies don’t have a strategy problem. They have an execution infrastructure problem.
Strategy translation is where that problem first becomes visible.
Want Help Applying This?
If this article reflects challenges you’re facing, I work with leaders and their teams to translate strategy into clear priorities, ownership, and consistent execution.
We can start with a focused 1:1 session to understand your goals, assess where execution is breaking down, and determine whether working together makes sense.
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