STRATEGY EXECUTION · TRANSFORMATION · ORGANIZATION ADVISORY
Make strategy work.
We help senior leaders build organizations that can execute strategy, and keep adapting as the world changes around them.
30 minutes with Carl. No pitch deck.
Good strategies routinely fail to become organizational reality.
The problem
Plans, milestones, governance and scorecards can all exist while decisions, roles and incentives carry on unchanged. Change happens inside a complex system that nobody can fully map in advance.
Activity is high, but movement is low.
The new operating model exists on paper. Old routines still run the work.
New evidence challenges your assumptions, with no disciplined way to update the plan.
When leaders call us
At inflection points, not for routine maintenance.
A new enterprise strategy that needs the organization to work differently
A transformation that has stalled
A major operating-model or business-model shift
Restructuring or turnaround
A merger, integration or redesign
Technology- or AI-driven change to work and roles
Culture renewal alongside strategic change
Our approach
Execution is a learning process, not obedience to a plan.
Five iterative phases
- 01AnticipateSense emerging change, diagnose fit and readiness, build adaptive capacity.
- 02ChooseMake sense of changing conditions and make consequential strategic choices.
- 03Translate & MobilizeTurn strategic intent into operating-model, capability, leadership and change requirements.
- 04Execute & AdaptTurn choices into changed behavior while learning and adjusting as reality unfolds.
- 05Institutionalize & RenewEmbed adaptive capability so the organization is better prepared for the next transition.
How we work
Integrate strategy and organization.
Strategy is not finished upstream and handed over for implementation.
Build adaptation into execution.
Set direction, act, learn and adapt, without confusing adaptation with drift.
Work on systems, not symptoms.
Structure, culture, leadership, decisions and routines operate together.
Evidence, candor and judgment.
Not fixed playbooks. We surface the real problem and tailor the work to it.
Services
Where we work
Experience
25+
Years leading change inside complex organizations
4
Enterprise transformations led
175
Strategic initiatives studied in PhD research
Carl really pushed us to think rigorously about how strategy translates into execution through structure, decision systems, and anticipating and adjusting ahead of outcomes.
Our approach
What changed
Situation: A new product category hit major technical integration problems, rooted in organizational silos.
Hardware
What changed: Product returns cut by 75% after planning and execution were redesigned with integration gates and escalation paths.
Situation: After a successful strategic shift, leaders struggled to confront a strained operating model and eroding capabilities.
Apparel
What changed: Over $600m in efficiencies from a redesigned operating model, reinvested in brand, product innovation and community.
Software
Situation: A new strategic framework had launched, but the organization still ran on the old one.
What changed: Decision rights clarified across four business units, with key parts of the organization redesigned to match.
Who you will work with
A senior practitioner who became a scholar
Carl Watson spent decades leading transformation, organization strategy and culture work inside large, complex organizations, and kept meeting the same problem: good strategies that never became organizational reality. His doctoral research set out to understand why, and what leaders can do differently.
PhD, Case Western Reserve University: research on strategic renewal and how organizations build the capabilities to adapt
Affiliated Research Scientist, Center for Effective Organizations, USC Marshall School of Business
VP, Transformation, Organization Strategy & Culture, Nike
Global Head of Organization Development, Microsoft
VP, Leadership & Organization Development JPMorgan Chase
25 years inside Nike, Microsoft and JPMorgan Chase
Insights
Research, translated into practice
Leading through a major change?
You don't need the whole path before you begin. You need the next step worth taking.
30 minutes with Carl. We reply within two business days. Or write directly to carl@madronastrategyworks.com