During visioning sessions with clients, we walk them through a DOS Exercise. DOS stands for Dangers, Opportunities and Strengths. This exercise helps them think through what strengths their firm currently has, what opportunities they can develop for future growth and what dangers they are facing. Dangers are what keeps them up at night—their biggest challenges.
Today, I want to walk you through a process for considering your firm’s dangers. It starts by examining the scope of the danger, considering the business reasons surrounding it and considering the personal impacts this danger has on you and your team.
Get specific
When looking at the scope of a danger, develop the starting and ending point on which you’re focused. Don’t say a danger is, “We need to be more strategic.” Be more specific than that. Why do you think your firm is not being strategic? What specific examples are you thinking about? This is where you may say,
“We have three partners, and they all have their own thoughts on where this company should be in three years.”
This is a good start towards figuring out the scope of your danger. Continue asking yourself questions to give you a framework before moving to the next step of the process. Think about the various discussions firm leaders have had on this particular issue. Think about the various ways you may or may not have tried to solve this in the past.
“A couple of years ago, we tried to have everyone write out their thoughts on the firm's future. We each shared our plans to see where there might be similarities and differences, but once the exercise was done, everyone thought their plan was the best one and we couldn’t come to an agreement. Everyone left the meeting continuing to do the same things they’d always done.”
Identify the business reason for addressing the danger
Once you have a good idea of what your danger is and can picture several examples of why this needs some attention, you’re ready to look at the business reasons for addressing this danger. Think about the ways you’ve tried to solve it in the past and why you don’t believe those attempts worked. How much has this danger cost the firm by not being resolved? What negative impact(s) has this had on the firm?
“It didn’t work because there was no one helping to run the meeting and facilitate constructive discussion to get everyone talking about what was best for the firm and the team. This costs us a lot of time, energy and even talent. Since the team doesn’t have a clear vision of where the firm is heading and how they are going to fit in the picture in the future, we’ve had huge turnover at all levels. During exit interviews, the number one reason individuals left was a lack of vision and direction from the top down.”
Identify how the danger impacts your team
Once you’ve gone through the second step of the process, you’re ready to investigate how this personally impacts you and your team. In the above example, we already know it’s affecting the team with turnover, but think through how this is affecting you directly. What frustrations does this danger cause you? How does this prevent you from getting your job done? If you have these frustrations, others on your team have them as well.
“It’s frustrating not having a good picture of the future since I don’t know how to prioritize the work I’m given. It’s hard to stay motivated since we don’t know the end game and what we’re working towards. It can also be confusing since one partner asks you to do one thing saying it’s the priority, but then another will come and ask for a different project to be placed as your top priority. We never seem to get anything done.”
Now that you’ve worked through these three steps you should be able to summarize the scope of the danger, how it’s affecting the business and how it’s personally affecting you and the rest of the team. From here, you can brainstorm the best ways to resolve this danger and make that a key strategic objective over the next year.
As the Solutions Manager for Boomer Consulting, Inc., Deanna works to help clients and prospective clients identify their dangers, opportunities and strengths. Once these are identified, she works to develop a personalized game plan for their firm to focus on the area, or areas, they need to improve on most. These areas are critical to a firm’s success and future-readiness; Leadership, Talent, Technology, Process and Growth.
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