Winning rhythm of review, refocus, recharge

The off-season in football is when your overall systems are developed and confirmed. During the pre-season is when you install the new offensive or defensive system and practise it throughout training camp.

The players understand it and the coaches believe in it. The plan is clear.

Then the first game happens. As the saying goes, “No plan survives first contact with the enemy.”

Suddenly, your systems don’t work. On offence, drives stall because timing is off and execution is uneven. On defence, missed assignments lead to big gains. By halftime, the scoreboard is not kind.

Questions begin to surface: do we stay with the game plan or change it? Experienced coaches are careful, and they separate what failed from what still has the potential to work.

This is not just a football question, it is a leadership question. And it often shows up in the business world.

An annual plan is launched or a sales initiative is introduced. The team is aligned, expectations are clear and early energy is high.

Then the initial results come in and they are underwhelming. Leaders face a choice: stay the course and risk continuing poor performance or change direction and risk abandoning a plan that may not have had time to work.

The challenge is poor early results do not tell you whether the plan is wrong. Early results often test leadership more than they test the plan. They expose impatience, uncertainty and the impulse to act quickly.

The instinct is to change something. The discipline is to understand what actually needs to change.

There are three things leaders should consider:

First, is the plan flawed or is the execution incomplete? In football, a new offensive system rarely looks smooth in the first game. Timing is still developing. Linemen are adjusting to new blocking schemes. Players are thinking instead of reacting.

The same is true in business. A new plan requires new behaviours, co-ordination and discipline. Early struggles are frequently a sign the organization has not yet executed consistently, not that the plan itself is wrong. This is especially true when the plan involves changing customer perception, behaviour or experience.

Second, have you given the plan enough time to produce a meaningful signal? Putting too much emphasis on early results can be misleading. They reflect noise more than insight.

In business, we often expect immediate results from initiatives that require time to take hold. New messaging, processes and ways of working need repetition before they produce consistent outcomes.

If you make adjustments before the plan has had time to work, you are not managing strategy, you are reacting to discomfort — which is not evidence, it’s emotion.

Third, what specifically is not working — and do you actually know why?

This is where many leaders make their biggest mistake. They observe a result they don’t like and immediately move to change the plan. What they often skip is a disciplined review of what is actually happening.

What part of the process is breaking down? Where is execution inconsistent? What assumptions may be incorrect? Without this level of understanding, any change is based on guesswork.

The best leaders don’t abandon the game plan, they review what is happening, not what they assume is happening. They refocus on the elements that drive customer value and performance. And they recharge by aligning the team around clear, adjusted actions with specific, targeted adjustments.

They stay committed to the plan, while refining how it is executed.

Review. Refocus. Recharge.

That rhythm creates stability in moments that often feel uncertain.

The temptation to change direction too quickly is understandable. Poor early results create pressure, they challenge confidence and they invite second-guessing. But constant change creates a different problem. It prevents any plan from being executed long enough to succeed.

Leaders who understand this build organizations that are both disciplined and adaptable. They know when to stay the course and when to adjust with purpose. Over time, that is what separates sporadic success from sustained performance.

Tim’s bits: Early results can be misleading. Don’t confuse discomfort with failure. Review carefully. Adjust deliberately. Stay committed to delivering value. That is how winning game plans are built.

Tim Kist is a certified management consultant, authorized by law, and a Fellow of the Institute of Certified Management Consultants of Manitoba

tim@tk3consulting.ca