Had a chance to attend a national Home Depot Conference when I was National Sales Manager for a regional HVAC company and James Murphy was the guest speaker. After years in the Airforce, James retired and started a program called Afterburner. Their moto is “Accelerating Performance Through Flawless Execution.” Here are the Six Steps of Mission Planning.
I. Determine the Mission Objective
- Clear – Measurable – Achievable
- Aligned to High Definition Destination (HDD)
- Drives Action
II. Identify the Threats
- Obstacles to Success
- Internal and External
- Controllable and Uncontrollable
III. Identify Your Available and Required Resources
- Resources to Achieve the Mission Success
- Mitigate or Eliminate Threats
- Consider resources in the following categories; training, leadership, people, clients/ customers, fiscal resources, systems, and technologies.
IV. Evaluate Lessons Learned
- Consider Experiences of the Team
- Experts Available for Consultation
- Documented Lessons Learned
- Go/ No Go
V. Develop a Course of Action
- Brainstorm in separate planning teams/ TeamStorming
- Red Team – incorporate comments into plan
- Create final Course of Action, Who, Does What, When
VI. Plan for Contingencies
- What Could Go Wrong – What If?
- Uncontrollable Threats
- Trigger – Action Steps
Remember: PLAN – BRIEF – EXECUTE – DEBRIEF
https://www.afterburner.com/products-solutions/flawless-execution/