For strategy and operations leaders at growth stage companies, change is a constant. However, amidst all the change and chaos, also comes the responsibility to keep everyone focused on the bigger vision and direction of the company. While the founders are often tasked with painting a grand vision for the company and setting the direction, it’s critical that your team has a strategic plan in place to match performance with direction. Whether you run an early stage startup, a growth stage company, or a unicorn on your way to IPO, you have to think carefully about how you are aligning teams with performance. That is where strategy execution software is critical.

There are a lot of components you have to think about if you would like to plan a successful business strategy. For example, where is the funding for your business going to come from? There is a good chance if your a growth stage SaaS company, your setting milestones for your next round of funding. You also have to think about how you are creating a new category of software or at least differentiating against legacy solutions and competitors. Who are the biggest competitors in your industry, and why are you different? How are you going to win against them in enterprise deals? These are just some of the questions leading strategy and operations professionals are thinking about regularly. 

Of course, formulating your strategy is only one part of the equation. You also have to think about the right software to help bring your strategy to life. That is where strategy execution management software comes into play. Whether inspiring your team around common goals or simply giving you a source of truth across your company’s performance, strategy execution management is critical for figuring out exactly how you are going to keep up with the individual goals and performance. If you use strategic alignment software to help you with this process, you can make sure you don’t overlook any part of your strategy.

Now comes the hard part, finding the right strategy execution software. The first step in finding the right solution is to figure out what your company needs and what are your biggest challenges to executing the strategy. Let’s start by looking at a few examples companies might be looking to implement and track.

Software Strategy Examples

If you have a software company, you may be wondering how you are going to develop a successful business strategy. When it comes to developing a strategic plan for a software development company, there is a lot you need to think about. It may be helpful to take a look at a software development strategy example. The first step in analyzing software strategy examples is to think about the individual pieces of your strategy. There are several important components you need to think about. These include:

• Capital: Not only do you need to think about how resource allocation aligns with your current cash on hand, but also, how does hiring and allocation align with future rounds of capital. Are you going to bootstrap your business? Or, are you planning on raising from venture capital firms? Do you want to go the crowdfunding route, seeing if there are people who are willing to provide you with the resources you need? This is an important part for building your strategy, because it dictates the goals and milestones you need to aim for in growth. 
• Marketing: You may have the best products and services in the world; however, if you don’t have a strong marketing strategy, it will be virtually impossible to scale your business effectively. Are you planning to go the traditional marketing route with account executives and business development resources? Or are you planning on being product led, and having free trials as your main source for acquisition? These are critical to assembling hiring plans, and building metrics like cost of acquisition that align with your goals.
• Competitors: In addition, you also have to do plenty of market research. Who are your biggest competitors in this industry? Why would someone decide to use your software program instead of the program of one of your competitors? Think about how you are going to make inroads in the current market. That way, you will be able to acquire customers effectively.

These are just a few of the many components you need to think about if you are trying to implement a successful strategy for a software company. Most importantly, you should view your strategy as a journey, not a destination. You should continuously reevaluate your current strategy, looking for ways to improve it. That way, you can place your company in the best position possible to be successful.

Strategy Plan Tracking Tools

Speaking of reviewing your current strategy, you also have to think about how you are going to put strategic planning in place across our company. That is where strategic plan tracking tools can be helpful. If you are looking for tracking tools, you are probably going to use a software platform. There are plenty of software programs that have been designed to help you get the most out of your business strategy. And while a free strategic planning software solution or a free strategic planning app might be appealing, the reality is those solutions rarely scale with your business and aren’t designed to be implemented throughout the company. 

Although it might seem like overkill to start your evaluation with premium strategic planning solutions, we’ve seen time and time again that the pain of implementing the wrong solution and trying to regain collective buy-in for the right solution far outweighs the initial discovery of finding the right platform for your team.  

If you decide to go with a more thorough approach to reviewing the market guide for strategy execution management software, you might want to start with evaluating a business strategy platform that allows for dynamic, real-time results. For example, you can take a look and see if you are on top of your goals, if you are falling behind, or if something has to change. One of the major benefits of using a premium solution is that you can automate a lot of the tasks that you used to do by hand. Think about how much time you currently spend assembling reports, chasing down updates, and trying to find data. Now, think about how much more successful your business would be if you could use this time elsewhere. If you can use your time to solve challenges and reduce friction in the business,  you may be able to help accelerate growth. 

These are just a few of the many reasons why you need to take the time to use strategic plan tracking tools that have been designed for your business strategy. Even though it may be tempting to save a few dollars by using a free tool, a premium solution will pay for itself because of the time savings and efficiency across your business. 

Best Strategic Planning Tools

If you can’t tell, we are big proponents of finding the right strategic planning tools for your business. Although there are several factors to finding the best strategic planning tools, it’s important to remember that the solution needs to align your company’s vision with your strategy.  Although you are probably thinking about cost, it is more important for you to think about the features of your strategy deployment software. Is there anything that is specific to your industry? Do you think your company is going to grow in the near future? If so, you need to look for these features when it comes to your business execution software.

For example, you may be looking for a tool that can help you adjust your strategy in real-time. If that is the case, then you need to find a tool that empowers cascade strategy software implementations. This type of solution is important because it allows you to grow and modify your strategy as your business grows and expands. That way, you keep every new employee, team, and department aligned towards the same goals and vision. 

This is where a solution like Elate can come into play. As the leading strategic planning software for high growth companies, Elate was built to help set individual OKRs for team members, as well as company themes that align your departments around common goals. With Elate you will be able to focus on driving accountability for goals and outcomes, automate follow-up, and communicate your company’s vision to the whole organization.

As you look to define and implement your company’s business strategy, it’s important to understand how that process is being rolled out throughout the organization to ensure performance matches your goals. We’d love to share how we are working with other leading strategy and ops professionals to help them deliver a solution that aligns all areas of the business for growth.