Focus: How to Plan Strategy and

Improve Execution to Achieve Growth

1st Edition Vikas Mittal
Visit to download the full and correct content document:
https://ebookmass.com/product/focus-how-to-plan-strategy-and-improve-execution-to
-achieve-growth-1st-edition-vikas-mittal/
More products digital (pdf, epub, mobi) instant
download maybe you interests ...

How to Achieve Inclusive Growth 1st Edition Valerie

Cerra

https://ebookmass.com/product/how-to-achieve-inclusive-
growth-1st-edition-valerie-cerra/

Smart Work: How to Increase Productivity, Achieve

Balance and Reduce Stress, 2nd Edition Dermot Crowley

https://ebookmass.com/product/smart-work-how-to-increase-
productivity-achieve-balance-and-reduce-stress-2nd-edition-
dermot-crowley/

Introduction to Software Testing: A Practical Guide to

Testing, Design, Automation, and Execution 1st Edition
Panagiotis Leloudas

https://ebookmass.com/product/introduction-to-software-testing-a-
practical-guide-to-testing-design-automation-and-execution-1st-
edition-panagiotis-leloudas/

The HAZOP Leader's Handbook: How to Plan and Conduct

Successful HAZOP Studies Philip Eames

https://ebookmass.com/product/the-hazop-leaders-handbook-how-to-
plan-and-conduct-successful-hazop-studies-philip-eames/
The Lean Strategy: Using Lean to Create Competitive
Advantage, Unleash Innovation, and Deliver Sustainable
Growth 1st Edition Daniel Jones

https://ebookmass.com/product/the-lean-strategy-using-lean-to-
create-competitive-advantage-unleash-innovation-and-deliver-
sustainable-growth-1st-edition-daniel-jones/

How to Make Your Money Work: Decide what you want, plan
to get there Eoin Mcgee

https://ebookmass.com/product/how-to-make-your-money-work-decide-
what-you-want-plan-to-get-there-eoin-mcgee/

Breached!: Why Data Security Law Fails and How to

Improve it Daniel J. Solove

https://ebookmass.com/product/breached-why-data-security-law-
fails-and-how-to-improve-it-daniel-j-solove-2/

Breached!: Why Data Security Law Fails and How to

Improve It Daniel J. Solove

https://ebookmass.com/product/breached-why-data-security-law-
fails-and-how-to-improve-it-daniel-j-solove/

Entrepreneur to Millionaire: How to Build a Highly

Profitable, Fast-Growth Company and Become
Embarrassingly Rich Doing It 1st Edition Kent
Billingsley
https://ebookmass.com/product/entrepreneur-to-millionaire-how-to-
build-a-highly-profitable-fast-growth-company-and-become-
embarrassingly-rich-doing-it-1st-edition-kent-billingsley/
 VIKAS MITTAL
SHRIHARI SRIDHAR

How to Plan Strategy

and Improve Execution
to Achieve Growth
 Focus

“For CEOs strategy planning can be frustrating. Finally, a clean approach that can
focus and sequence the work, bring the voice of the customer to the center of the
plan, provide a concrete link between strategy and sales growth, and mitigate analysis
paralysis.”
—John Kaul, Chief Executive Officer, Allredi

“If you want to build a business strategy that drives financial outcomes like sales,
revenue & profitability, stop using your current approach. Customer-based strategy
is the only framework that links customer value to product portfolio & customer
segmentation choices, investment & budgeting decisions, aligned priorities for all
departments, and individual accountability & performance.”
—Maggie Seeliger, Senior Vice President—Strategy, Sodexo Energy and Resources
Worldwide

“I’ve been involved in strategy planning for numerous organizations. This book’s
approach is a quantum leap forward. It focuses, streamlines, and improves strategy
planning bringing customer value at the center of it.”
—Heather Wisialowski, Chief Revenue Officer, Allredi

“Implementing this strategy approach cut out all the guess work from strategy plan-
ning work. As the CEO, I can finally link strategy to financial outcomes, prioritize
initiatives, and focus my senior executives on what matters most to our clients.”
—Simon Seaton, Chief Executive Officer, Sodexo Energy and Resources Worldwide

“Boards, CEOs, and senior executives use a lot of gut feel and guesswork in strategy
planning. This book first documents why that can harm strategy planning and then
shows how a modern approach rooted in scientific thinking can reform the strategy
process. As the CEO of many successful companies, I highly recommend this book
to those aspiring to be transformative CEOs and strategy leaders.”
—Rahul Mehta, Chief Executive Officer, Mehta Family Foundation and
NuView, Inc.
 Vikas Mittal • Shrihari Sridhar

Focus
How to Plan Strategy and Improve
Execution to Achieve Growth
Vikas Mittal Shrihari Sridhar
Rice University Texas A&M University
Houston, TX, USA College Station, TX, USA

ISBN 978-3-030-70719-4    ISBN 978-3-030-70720-0 (eBook)

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-70720-0

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Switzerland AG,
part of Springer Nature 2021
This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the
whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations,
recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or informa-
tion storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology
now known or hereafter developed.
The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does
not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective
laws and regulations and therefore free for general use.
The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are
believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors
give a warranty, expressed or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omis-
sions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published
maps and institutional affiliations.

This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Switzerland AG.
The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland
 Preface

Shrihari Sridhar CEOs and senior executives have exciting and invigorating
jobs. They are charged with formulating a strategy to focus and align their
organization to deliver sales and profit growth. They are also responsible for
executing the strategy to the satisfaction of their board with the help of many
stakeholders, including employees and suppliers. In theory, senior executives
should view their charge as one of the most exciting opportunities to impact
their organization.
Executives’ jobs are also mind-­bogglingly frustrating. On an ongoing basis,
senior executives develop their company’s mission and vision, finalize its bud-
get, manage stakeholder expectations, execute strategy, assess ongoing risks,
fight fires, and communicate with the outside world. Their efforts occur
against an industry backdrop in which they not only have less autonomy and
shorter tenure than two decades ago, but they also must deal with heightened
demands for accountability, transparency, and scrutiny. They must reckon
with increasingly rapid technological change and intense competition. It is
not surprising many executives feel worn out by strategy and execution.
According to CEOs, the biggest issue confronting executives is the need for
perennial and sustained focus. CEOs need ways to focus their senior execu-
tives’ efforts in developing and executing coherent strategy, a challenge height-
ened by the divergent goals and demands of diverse stakeholders—customers,
employees, suppliers, shareholders, and board members. As one CEO stated:

The board wants me to cut costs and grow margins, institutional investors want
me to promote a sustainability agenda, employees are frustrated with layoffs.
Customers seek better after-­­sales service. I’ve taken out over a billion dollars in
costs, but the strategy has left most customers and employees unsatisfied.

v
vi Preface

Another CEO said of creating strategy for an energy company:

I hear from the sales team that safety is the key differentiator for winning new
work, even though every interaction with clients reveals that our bids are over-
priced. To this, the board constantly reminds me that we have not fulfilled our
strategy goal of being fully digital by 2020, and this has irked some institutional
shareholders who questioned the company’s lackluster CSR score in the last
investor call.

This book addresses four questions asked by many CEOs:

• What is the state of strategy formulation and execution in companies

like mine?
• Why is the strategy process so frustrating and difficult, and how can it be
simplified?
• How can senior executives on my team meaningfully improve strategy
planning and execution to grow sales and profit?
• How can my company hold the strategy planning process to account?

To test whether executives understand the four questions’ nuances, this

book asks them to take a simple quiz consisting of ten questions. The resulting
scores provide a strategy planning quotient, a realistic read of respondents’
understanding of the strategy process based on research, rather than hearsay.
Most executives’ quotients are far lower than they expect, a stark reminder of
why this book can help them achieve extraordinary results through strategy
planning and execution.
Our research over a four-­year period includes multiple large-­scale assess-
ments of more than 6000 executives and managers in varied industries, sur-
veys of over 11,000 customers of different companies, a systematic
meta-­analysis of strategy outcomes research over the past 70 years, more than
100 hours of in-­depth interviews and discussions with senior executives and
CEOs, and a series of workshops with board members and executives to test
and refine our ideas. This book’s overarching theme—a need for systematic
focus—surfaced again and again throughout the research process.
CEOs value strategy planning but see it as a complex process that could be
dramatically improved. In-­depth interviews uncovered eight central issues
that beset strategy planning processes and frustrate CEOs. The issues affect
companies’ broad direction and extend to concrete strategy implementation
by senior executives and middle management. CEOs and senior executives
who read this book will relate to the eight frustrations, but they will also learn
 Preface vii

to alleviate them through a strategy process engaging leadership more mean-

ingfully, better leveraging their ideas, and coordinating their actions for supe-
rior results.
To validate the executives’ views, this book compiles and examines a broad
set of evidence. We surveyed thousands of employees, managers and execu-
tives, and customers. We examined academic studies published in peer-­­
reviewed journals, systematic reviews and meta-­analyses of published empirical
research, and in-­depth business case studies. The research consistently showed
senior executives, middle managers, and frontline employees were skeptical
about the strategy process their company used, spent most of their time on
tasks unrelated to strategy, and believed strategy planning had no association
with financial performance. The discoveries coincided with a large-­scale syn-
thesis of research over seven decades and 758 strategy planning correlations
over several decades. To be blunt, strategy planning has little to no statistical
association with financial performance, and senior executives are wary of its
potential.
How can senior executives realize the promise of strategy planning? The
book describes three predominant approaches to strategy planning—the
inspirational, adhocratic, and budget-­based approaches. Companies typically
use some combination of the three. Each approach brings its own assump-
tions, constraints, and inhibitors, which impede well-­meaning executives’
realization of their strategy plan’s promise. To delve deeper into the strategy
planning approaches, the book deconstructs their efficacy using a combina-
tion of in-­depth interviews, synthesis of more than five decades of academic
studies, and our own original research.
The inspirational strategy planning approach is rooted in anthropology and
predicated on senior executives’ ability to articulate their organization’s mis-
sion, vision, and values. The mission, vision, and values motivate senior and
middle management and frontline employees to follow their company’s north
star. Notwithstanding its purported advantages, the approach (1) tends to be
subjective and vague; (2) has an overly broad and overarching scope; (3) is
inward looking, echoing senior executives’ desires but eschewing customer
needs; and (4) rarely provides the focus and clarity employees need to imple-
ment strategy. New research shared in this book shows mission statements
serve senior leaders’ aspirations and de-­emphasize strategy areas important to
customers. And virtually no statistical association emerges between elements
of company mission statements and customer needs.
The adhocratic approach to strategy planning is informal, unstructured,
and emergent, and embraces experimentation and improvisation. Typically
used in startups and small businesses, the approach relies on routine,
viii Preface

day-­to-­day implementation activities to provide a stable, consistent, and

repeatable framework for identifying and meeting strategy goals. Multiple
peer-­reviewed studies show adhocracies foster unending experimentation and
improvisation at the expense of predictability through repeatable and stable
systems. Our research shows adhocratic strategy planning processes heavily
favor innovation, technology, product development, flexibility, and adaptabil-
ity. The approach fosters an internal focus, tilting companies away from cus-
tomers. Indeed, adhocratic companies satisfy only 2%–6% of their
customers’ needs.
The budget-­ based strategy planning approach, rooted in economics,
finance, and operations management, emphasizes formal and systematic pro-
cesses to couple budgeting with goal setting, resource allocation, and employee
accountability. Senior executives use budgets to focus on operational excel-
lence and control. Yet, research shows elaborate budget-­based plans serve
more as signals to external stakeholders than coherent strategies. Our research
shows budget-­based strategy makes companies inward looking instead of cus-
tomer focused, which inevitably hurts performance.
Why should one read this book? Board members, CEOs, senior executives,
middle managers, and C-­suite aspirants will gain a deep understanding of the
three strategy planning approaches and their potential pitfalls when it comes
to delivering financial results. The book uncovers seven strategy planning
inhibitors that impede the process’s effectiveness in companies large and small.
The inhibitors do not reflect executives’ inherent weaknesses. Nor can execu-
tives eliminate the inhibitors by being aware of their existence or being more
thoughtful. Strategy inhibitors are behavioral tendencies impeding the plan-
ning process, and systematic changes are required to eliminate them.
This book delineates seven research-­based strategy enablers executives can
use to un-­inhibit their inhibitors. The enablers go beyond the usual prescrip-
tions and exhortations for senior executives to be smarter, better problem
solvers, and more thoughtful. They serve as systematic factors that must be
incorporated in the strategy process at all levels: Replacing salience-­based
decisions with a scientifically developed strategy map, developing consensus
on the map’s components, developing measures of strategy components and
weighting them based on importance, using mathematical analysis to calcu-
late the give-­get weights of each strategy map linkage, and setting aside one’s
ego, personal biases, and salient thoughts to accept the strategy analysis.
The book closes with the story of Exterior, Inc., a premium-­price manufac-
turer of roofing tiles for custom-­home builders. Exterior’s CEO, working dili-
gently with his senior executives, transformed the company’s strategy process
 Preface ix

and goals and achieved financial success through three phases: a strategy
dilemma, a shift to customer-­focused strategy formulation, and committing
to customer-­focused strategy implementation. The story illustrates the diffi-
culties of strategy planning, common CEO frustrations, and potential strat-
egy inhibitors and enablers. It serves as a powerful reminder that implementing
an enabled strategy process requires complete and unwavering commitment
from the entire senior executive team.
For C-­suite executives (e.g., chief executive officers, chief financial officers,
and chief strategy officers), senior executives (e.g., vice presidents, senior vice
presidents, and division presidents), middle managers (e.g., directors and
senior managers) and others aspiring to leadership positions, functional exec-
utives (e.g., sales, marketing, supply chain, and operations directors) seeking
corporate roles, and management students, this book provides a robust strat-
egy planning framework consisting of five repeatable and predictable mile-
stones. It should appeal to board members wanting to eliminate inhibitors
and inculcate enablers for budding CEOs.
Many change management consultants seek specific examples, frameworks,
and toolkits to help senior executives change their strategy process. Yet, most
available material focuses on personal change management and executive self-­­
improvement. This book takes the opposite perspective. To enhance its strat-
egy formulation, a company doesn’t have to make its executives smarter or
better. By identifying inhibitors and replacing them with enablers, companies
can allow ordinary CEOs and executives to achieve extraordinary results.
We invite you to read this book and embark on your transformational jour-
ney—to transform the strategy process in your organization. Start by taking
the quiz in Chap. 1 to calculate your strategy planning quotient, a measure of
your understanding of strategy planning. We challenge you to improve it!

Houston, TX Vikas Mittal

Shrihari Sridhar
 Acknowledgments

We have many people to thank for this book’s beautiful four-­year journey.
Vikas thanks his wife, Nandita Gupta, and daughter, Sukul Mittal, for
enabling him in more ways than they can imagine. Shrihari (Hari) thanks
his wife, Akshaya Sreenivasan, and son, Virat Shrihari, who are the very
purpose of his existence and for all things positive and worth appreciating
in life.
Beyond our families, so many people have contributed to making this
endeavor fulfilling. We are grateful to the many co-­authors and doctoral
students who have provided unwavering commitment and support to our
research over the years. Shea Gibbs at Gibbs Communications has been
an invaluable ally throughout this journey. We thank all our undergradu-
ate, MBA, MS analytics, and executive students, whose questions and
suggestions have taught us new ways to look at the age-­old problem of
strategy planning.
This book would not be possible without the fidelity and commitment
of dozens of CEOs and senior executives, who showed the flexibility neces-
sary to think differently in pursuit of their transformative strategy. Terry
Grier, John Kaul, Joshua Robinson, Simon Seaton, Maggie Seeliger, and
Heather Wisialowski generously shared their time and perspective, pro-
vided input, and listened to and critiqued ideas different from their own.
Bo Bothe, Jonathan Fisher, Bonnie Houston, and Ravi Kathuria shared
their perspective and frustrations on strategy implementation and provided
feedback on earlier drafts of our work. Paul DeLisi, Troy Thacker, and Alan

xi
xii Acknowledgments

Ying provided strategy planning perspectives from the private equity van-
tage point, underscoring the crucial role of senior executives in strategy
planning and execution.
Finally, we cannot adequately express our gratitude to Rahul Mehta—our
Yoda, personal mentor, and motivator. Rahul has consistently believed in us,
the ideas expressed in this book, and this endeavor’s potential more than even
we ourselves have.
 Contents

1 Strategy Planning in the Real World  1

1.1 Understanding Strategy Planning   1
1.2 Eight Strategy Stories   2
1.3 Calculating Your Strategy Planning Quotient   4
1.4 Improving Your Strategy Planning Quotient   8

2 The CEO Perspective on Strategy Planning 11

2.1 Listening to CEOs  12
2.2 One: Lacking a Customer Lens  13
2.3 Two: Informed by Siloed and Bifurcated Research That
Misleads 14
2.4 Three: No Meaningful Comparisons  16
2.5 Four: Analysis Paralysis  17
2.6 Five: Lacking a Link Between Strategy and Financial
Outcomes 18
2.7 Six: No Meaningful Way to Focus and Sequence
Executives’ Effort  20
2.8 Seven: Following Executives’ Personal Preferences to
Define Strategy  21
2.9 Eight: No Blueprint for Alignment  23
2.10 Conclusion  24

3 The Perils and Promise of Strategy Planning 25

3.1 What CEOs Believe  25
3.2 What Senior Executives and Managers Believe  26
3.3 Executives’ Subjective Beliefs and Objective Reality  29

xiii
xiv Contents

3.4 Three Studies of Executive Beliefs  35

3.5 National Study of Executive Beliefs  40
3.6 FACILITYCO Executives’ Beliefs and Customer Needs  41
3.7 Mitigating Perils and Maximizing Promise  43

4 The Inspirational Executive: Strategy Planning Through

Mission, Vision, and Values 47
4.1 Understanding the Inspirational Approach  48
4.2 Evaluating the Inspirational Approach to Strategy  53
4.3 The Perils of Mission Statements  55
4.4 The Inspirational Approach: Research Evidence  56
4.5 Conclusion  61

5 The Superhero Executive: Strategy Planning Through

Adhocracy 65
5.1 Overemphasizing Exploration  68
5.2 Overemphasizing Innovation  71
5.3 Pioneering Industries  72
5.4 New Research  73
5.5 Conclusion  77

6 The Analytical Executive: Budget-Based Strategy Planning 81

6.1 Evaluating the Budget-Based Approach  84
6.2 Examining New Evidence  91
6.3 Conclusion  96

7 Strategy Planning Inhibitors 99

7.1 Inhibitor 1: Confusing Salience with Importance 100
7.2 Inhibitor 2: Intuitive Leaps 103
7.3 Inhibitor 3: Belief in Mythical Numbers 108
7.4 Inhibitor 4: Staying Put 110
7.5 Inhibitor 5: More-Is-Better Thinking 114
7.6 Inhibitor 6: Inwardly Focused and Discordant 115
7.7 Inhibitor 7: Decoupled Measurement and Diffuse
Accountability119
7.8 Conclusion 121

8 Strategy Planning Enablers127

8.1 Enabler 1: Chain-link Your Strategy Map 129
8.2 Enabler 2: Know the Give-Get of Each Link 131
 Contents xv

8.3 Enabler 3: Achieve More by Doing Less 133

8.4 Enabler 4: Relentlessly Implement the Not-­To-Do List 134
8.5 Enabler 5: Flip the Planning Template 136
8.6 Enabler 6: Embed Science in Strategy Planning 137
8.7 Enabler 7: Approach the Planning Process with Humility 139
8.8 Conclusion 140

9 Exterior, Inc.’s Strategy Success Story143

9.1 Exterior, Inc.: 2008–2014144
9.2 Exterior’s Strategy Planning Dilemma: 2014145
9.3 Rewiring the Strategy Planning Process: 2015149
9.4 Exterior’s Strategy Enabled Not Inhibited: 2015–2017153
9.5 Conclusion 157

10 Increasing the Strategy Planning Quotient159

10.1 Not All CEOs Are Strategy Leaders 160
10.2 How Can CEOs Increase Their Strategy Planning
Quotient?163
10.3 How Can Senior Executives Increase Their Strategy
Planning Quotient? 165
10.4 Review and Refine Your Company’s Strategy Process 167
10.5 Creating a Robust Strategy Planning Framework 169
10.6 Conclusion 171

Index173
 List of Figures

Fig. 1.1 Strategy planning quotient scoring sheet 8

Fig. 2.1 CEOs’ issues with strategy planning 13
Fig. 3.1 Executives’ agreement with CEOs’ top-three strategy objectives 28
Fig. 3.2 Time executives spend on activities/areas 29
Fig. 3.3 Association between strategy planning and performance outcomes 33
Fig. 3.4 Executive MBA student survey’s respondent profile 36
Fig. 3.5 Executives’ opinions on strategy planning 36
Fig. 3.6 Executives’ perception of correlation between strategy goals and
sales/profits37
Fig. 3.7 Executives’ perceived impact of strategy planning 38
Fig. 3.8 Advisory group’s beliefs about strategy planning and sales/profits 39
Fig. 3.9 Survey of energy industry advisory group 39
Fig. 4.1 Comparing strategic areas for energy companies using mission
statements57
Fig. 4.2 Comparing strategic areas for energy companies using 10-­K reports 58
Fig. 4.3 Comparing strategic areas for B2B companies using mission
statements60
Fig. 4.4 Comparing strategic areas for B2B companies using 10-­K reports 60
Fig. 5.1 How eight strategic areas drive B2B customer value 74
Fig. 5.2 How execution levers enhance product/service quality for B2B
customers75
Fig. 5.3 How eight strategic areas drive value for energy customers 76
Fig. 5.4 How execution levers enhance product/service quality for energy
customers76

xvii
xviii List of Figures

Fig. 6.1 Customer satisfaction, efficiency, and gross margin 95

Fig. 6.2 Comparison of relative satisfaction with strategic areas 96
Fig. 7.1 Strategic area salience and importance for FOODCO 101
Fig. 7.2 Intuitive leaps at nursing homes 104
Fig. 7.3 Intuitive leaps at FOODCO 106
Fig. 7.4 Decoupled metrics at SCHOOLCO 121
Fig. 10.1 Strategy process milestones 170
 List of Tables

Table 3.1 Strategy planning effectiveness by measure type 33

Table 3.2 Strategy planning effectiveness incidence by measure type 35
Table 3.3 Misalignment of FACILITYCO executives and customers 42
Table 6.1 Importance of product/service in driving customer value 92
Table 6.2 Financial performance and perceived product quality 93
Table 9.1 Exterior Inc.’s performance, 2007 versus 2014 145
Table 9.2 Customer assessment results, 2015 151
Table 9.3 Customer assessment results, 2015 153
Table 9.4 Customer assessment results, 2017 157

xix
 1
Strategy Planning in the Real World

1.1 Understanding Strategy Planning

Strategy planning is the process by which a company sets goals, assigns
resources, defines major initiatives, and creates a budget. It is a critical activity
for most of the corporate world. More than 88% of all large companies engage
in a formal strategy planning process at regular intervals, ranging from one
year to ten years.1
Oil and gas companies like Shell, Texaco, and Elf have reported using dual
systems that include medium-­and long-­term strategic plans spanning 5–10
years.2 But strategy planning is not restricted to large companies. More than
80% of small-­and medium-­sized firms have formal strategy plans that they
update at one-­to three-­year intervals.3
Strategy planning varies across companies. Some admit to using an intui-
tive and emergent approach. Other companies use strategy planning to define,
refine, or emphasize their mission, vision, and values. Others create formal
plans integrating financial budgeting and operational planning; the strategy
sets the financial and operational priorities for the upcoming plan period.
Companies like Amoco and ExxonMobil use strategy plans emphasizing
broad strategic themes, such as becoming a global gas business with a cost-
reduction focus, but do not specify formal action plans.4
Why is strategy planning important? Given unpredictable future events,
marketplace turbulence, intense competitive pressure, evolving customer
needs, and ever-­changing technology, regulations, and societies, executives
use strategy planning to see the big picture. In an ideal world, strategy plans

© The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2021 1

V. Mittal, S. Sridhar, Focus, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-70720-0_1
2 V. Mittal and S. Sridhar

help a company identify its top priorities, align resources to priorities, and use
the resources to drive accountability at all organizational levels.
How does strategy planning unfold at different companies, and does it help
senior executives achieve their goals? Whether through corporate retreats or
deep-­dive sessions, small and large companies discuss viewpoints, debate
alternative strategies, develop mission statements, create goals, and use execu-
tion plans to implement and achieve their goals.

1.2 Eight Strategy Stories

CEOs and senior executives face many situations—simple to complex, sad to
funny, perplexing to straightforward—during strategy planning. In the fol-
lowing strategy planning stories, the names of the companies have been
changed to maintain their anonymity.
Engineering and Projects Company (EPCO). EPCO is a major engi-
neering and procurement company headquartered in Houston, with sales
offices in the Middle East, South America, North America, and Asia. Due to
EPCO’s declining business, the executive team convinced the CEO to tilt the
company’s strategy plan toward acquiring new customers. With a project win
rate of 28%, the team reasoned that a larger pipeline of bids would translate
to more sales. The chief sales officer commented, “This will allow us to forge
a new direction to turn the company around.”
As the company bid more, its win rate did not improve, nor did its backlog.
Customers started complaining about poorly managed projects, missed dead-
lines, and lack of communication among project staff. With several cancelled
projects, the CEO eventually reorganized the company, replacing all but two
senior executives.
Fast Casual Restaurant Chain (FOODCO). When the lunch-­focused
restaurant chain FOODCO was hit with stagnating sales, its CEO and owner
wanted to improve its strategy. He focused on the many different menu items
he believed would preserve FOODCO’s “high quality”—freshly prepared
sandwiches, soups, and salads. Yet, customer surveys showed that customers
wanted a fast dining experience with a short wait time, a simple menu with
few items, ample parking, and a bill lower than $12 per meal, drinks included.
The survey results contrasted starkly with the strategy direction FOODCO’s
owner charted.
When FOODCO’s owner read the survey findings, he said, “This validates
what has been clear to me all along. We have to lead and not be led. Too often,
customers don’t know what they want, and we have to shape their needs.
 1 Strategy Planning in the Real World 3

Look at Apple. We need a winning strategy that differentiates our brands, and
we can do that by offering the largest selection of freshly prepared foods at the
lowest price point in the marketplace.”
Machine Tools Solutions Company (TOOLCO). TOOLCO’s project
management division included 80 people: 10 senior leaders, 26 project direc-
tors, and 44 analysts, line managers, and support staff. Every year, the division
managed more than 200 projects worth $800 million. Division employees
spent almost 80% of their time fulfilling projects. They spent their remaining
time advancing strategic initiatives related to project management. The divi-
sion deployed 97 strategic initiatives, of which only nine were deemed
effective.
During a strategy retreat, TOOLCO’s senior executives reviewed the initia-
tives. They decided to add two initiatives to increase the effectiveness of their
current portfolio of initiatives. One initiative was to create a 360-­degree view
of the project management process through an expensive CRM system. A
second initiative was to add more quality control training modules. The man-
agers prepared a proposal to increase TOOLCO’s annual strategy implemen-
tation budget from $31 million to $40 million.
U.S. Urban School District (SCHOOLCO). At SCHOOLCO, a large
K-­12 school district and one of the largest nonprofit enterprises in the county,
the assistant superintendent for each function—academics, human resources,
operations, etc.—contributed to initiatives he or she deemed important. Each
assistant superintendent sought to obtain funding, increase staff size, and gain
influence and power within the district. SCHOOLCO’s strategic plan prom-
ised to implement 168 initiatives over five years. Each year, the district added
initiatives during the strategy planning process but rarely if ever removed
initiatives.
Onsite-­Medical Company (MEDCO). The physician-­owner of a medical
practice focused on the daily activities while running the firm. MEDCO
therefore made strategy decisions, such as upgrading medical-­records soft-
ware, outsourcing billing, and adding new patient segments, on an ad hoc
basis. For MEDCO, action was primary, and planning was a support activity.
MEDCO’s weekly meetings functioned as strategy meetings. “I don’t have the
luxury that big corporations have,” the physician-­owner said. “Strategy plan-
ning will cost me thousands of dollars in time and money. All I need to do is
maintain my daily average of 20 patients, and I’m good to go.”
Property Management Company (REALTYCO). The president of a
small property management company focused on ensuring all his firm’s prop-
erties were rented and maintained. While REALTYCO’s strategy goal was to
grow the number of properties under management, its daily activities were
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
his friends and bound them to him, where he entertained them and
gave them cheer. His business was a constant thing with him; he
never quit or laid it aside; and it was a great part of his business to
get acquainted. He took them to his home; it was open to all, and
there was a seat for any and all at his table. He kept open house the
year around. When friends came it was hard to get away; he would
hold on to them as he would to a book. He loved the people; they
were a study to him; a very joy and pleasure, a real delight. Among
the people he is perfectly at home, and they are made to feel that
“come and see me” means just that, and all that that means. He is
like a father or big brother out among them. They all knew him, and
knew where he lived,—in that “brown house on Green Street.” This
was back in those years before he was so largely in Washington,
and before he had his pleasant and more commodious house and
grounds near the capitol.
The whole care of the home was upon Mrs. Blaine, who looked after
everything down to the veriest minutiæ. She was thoroughly in
sympathy with him, was pleased with what he enjoyed; and so was
perfectly willing their home should be the rallying-place for his hosts
of friends, who might come and go at will. The Maine legislature met
at his house during the Garcelon trouble.
Mr. Blaine attended strictly to his work, and that meant the people,—
strangers, and townspeople, one and all. He never, I am credibly
informed, bought a pound of steak in his life, nor a barrel of flour;
never went to a grocery store to buy anything. He has had no time or
thought for things like these. He has been a student and teacher all
his life; a close, deep, careful reader and thinker. He had never been
in a printing-office in his life until he became editor, and had to learn
the people, study them, get politics from their ways of thinking and
looking at things; and it was a matter of principle with him to make
the thing go. It is not a half-dozen things, but “This one thing I do,”
with him, and he does it. But he has always been regular at his
meals, as a matter of health, and so a law of life. He was no
epicurean; cared only for the more substantial things of diet, and
never seemed to be particular about what he ate, except one thing,
and that he liked, and always wanted them in their season, and
always had them. It was baked sweet apples and milk at the close of
every meal. And then he would sit and read, and read, and read,
especially after supper, and Mrs. Blaine, if she wanted him to move
from the table, would say, “James! James!” and again, “James!” like
enough half a dozen times before he would hear, and she pleasant
and careful of him all the time. She has had mind and heart to know
his worth, and has needed no one to tell her that teaching school in
Kentucky has paid her a handsome dividend and is full of promise
for the future. He has made no move but what she has seconded the
motion. Her life is in his, and not a thing independent and apart from
it.
One who knew her well in those early years, and knows her well to-
day, said of Mrs. Blaine, “She is just as lovely as she can be; of
superior culture, and a real, true mother.”
The gentleman who was Mr. Blaine’s foreman, and for a year and a
half made his home with them, is most enthusiastic in their praise.
He tells what a real mother Mrs. Blaine was to him if he was sick, or
anything the matter with him, how she would take the best of care of
him. Every winter they published a tri-weekly during the session of
the legislature, and this kept him at the office late every-other night,
and she would be “worried about him because he had to work
nights,” and Mr. Blaine would say, “Howard, you are worth a dozen
boys (shiftless, good-for-nothing boys, he meant), but you must not
work so hard.” The humanities of life were the amenities to them.
This same man, who has since been editor and proprietor of Mr.
Blaine’s old paper, said with depth of feeling, and strong emphasis, “I
wish every voter in America had had my opportunity for eighteen
months, right in his own home, to see and know Mr. Blaine, they
would find out then what a royal man he is.”
In less than ten days after his nomination, parties of prominence,
connected with a paper favorable to his election, but located in quite
a city where a leading Republican paper affects to oppose him,
visited Augusta, and called upon his political enemies, and enquired
into his private, social, and domestic life, and they finally confessed
there was no lisp or syllable of aught to tarnish his name or cause a
blush. It is all pure, and sweet, and clear.
When Mr. and Mrs. Blaine first entered their Augusta home, a bright
and beautiful baby boy was in the arms of Mrs. Blaine. He was the
pride and joy of the home, their first-born. His name was Stanwood
Blaine, taking his mother’s maiden-name. One short, bright year of
sunshine, and prattle, and glee, and a dark cloud rested on that
home; a deep sorrow stung the life of that father, and heavy grief
oppressed the heart of the mother,—their little Stanwood was gone;
he was among the jewels on high, and there he is to-day, while a
lovely picture of him adorns the present home.
Since then, six children have been born to them,—John Walker, a
graduate of Yale college, and a member of the Alabama Court of
Claims; Robert Emmons, a graduate of Harvard college, now
connected with the North-western Railroad, in Chicago; Alice, the
wife of Colonel Coppinger; Margaret; James Gillespie, Jr., and
Hattie, named for her mother, Harriet. Walker, the oldest, is about
thirty-one years old, and unmarried. Hattie, the youngest, is fourteen
years of age. All of the children have been born in Augusta, and with
but two or three exceptions, in the old home on Green Street.
Mr. Blaine has been accustomed to sit up quite late at night with
books, papers, and letters, and make up his sleep in the morning. He
loves a good story, and keeps a fund on hand constantly, and they
serve his purpose well. There is one he has enjoyed telling to knots
of friends here and there, and especially when friends have gathered
at his table. The Maine law, in the interest of temperance, was a
leading issue in the state during Mr. Blaine’s connection with the
Journal. It fell to the lot of his partner, John L. Stevens, who had
been a minister, to write the temperance articles, and he would write
them long and strong. It was a custom with Mr. Blaine to go around
among the workmen and chat with them, a few words of good cheer.
Among them was an Irishman named John Murphy, who loved his
glass. He was a witty fellow, and generally had something to say.
One day while Mr. Blaine was around, Murphy had a large, long
manuscript from Mr. Stevens, on temperance, which he was setting
up in type. It was a hard job, and the day was hot. He was about half
through, when he called out to the foreman,—
“Owen, have you a quarter?”
“Yes, sir! What do you want of it?”
All were listening, including Mr. Blaine, for they expected something
bright and sharp.
“Well, sir, I thought I would have to be after having something to wet
me throat wid before I got through with this long, dry temperance
job.”
Everybody roared at the Irishman’s quaint sally. It struck Mr. Blaine
as particularly dry and ludicrous; he laughed outright, and he would
tell it as a good joke on his partner.
Mr. Blaine has never talked about people behind their backs; he is
no gossiper. He is a fearless man, and if he has anything to say to a
man he says it squarely to his face. There is a purity of tone and
richness of life in his home, that are both noticeable and remarkable.
There seem to be no frictions, gratings, or harshness. One of ample
opportunity has said, “I never heard him speak a cross word to his
children.” He is rather indulgent than otherwise. While he may be, as
case requires, the strong, central government, they are as sovereign
states; no rebellion manifests itself, requiring coercion.
Mr. Blaine’s family have been accustomed to attend church, and the
family pew is always full. Father and mother are both members of
the Congregational Church, and have the reputation of being
devoted Christians and liberal supporters of the church. Mr. Blaine
tells them to put down what they want from him, and he will pay it.
He has the reputation of being one of the best Bible-class teachers
in the city. His long drill at college, reading the New Testament
through in Greek several times, has helped him in this. A Mission
Sabbath-school was started down in the lower part of Augusta, and
he went down with the others and taught a large Bible-class. His old
pastors, Doctor Ecob, of Albany, N. Y., and Doctor Webb, of Boston,
Mass., bear the highest testimony to his Christian character and
integrity. It was said of him at Cincinnati, that “he needed no
certificate of moral character from a Rebel congress,” and a very
careful examination proves it true. No man could, it would seem, by
any possibility, stand better in his own home community than does
Mr. Blaine. It is not simply cold, formal endorsement, as a matter of
self-respect and state-pride, but the clear, strong words of a deep
and powerful friendship, that one constantly hears who will stand in
the light and let it shine on him.
There were in his Green-street home, parlor, sitting-room, dining-
room, and kitchen, down-stairs, and corresponding rooms up-stairs.
There was quite a large side-yard, with numerous trees, and garden
in the rear. The barn and rear part of the house were connected by a
long wood-house, as is the custom in New England. It was an ample
and respectable place for a young editor and politician to reside, and
while it was up on the hill or low bluff from Water Street, down near
the Kennebec River, where the business portion of the city was, and
his office was located, still it was quite convenient for him.
His old office was burned in the big fire of 1865, which destroyed the
business portion of the city, but the desk was saved at which he did
much of his writing when in charge of the office of the Journal during
the presidential campaign of 1860.
During this campaign there was so much to excite him, so much
news to read, so many speeches to make, so many ways to go, and
such a general monopoly of time and attention, that very early in the
morning they would get out of “copy.” The foreman would say,—and
he was a very kind-hearted man, and loved Mr. Blaine,—
“I don’t see any way for you to do, Dan, but to go up to Mr. Blaine’s,
and wake him up, and tell him we must have some more copy.”
Up he would go to the Green-street home, and rouse him up. Mr.
Blaine would come down in his study-gown and slippers and say,—
“What, that copy given out?”
“Yes, sir, and we will have to have more right away!”
“Well, what did he do, sit right down and dash it off for you?”
“Yes, sometimes, and sometimes he would take the scissors.”
This was said with a mild, significant smile.
Mr. Blaine could write anywhere, and did much of it out in the dining-
room on the supper-table, with his family all about him. He would
become oblivious of all surroundings, and with his power of
penetration and concentration, adapt himself to his work, utterly lost
to circumstances.
He had no mercy on meanness. It roused his whole nature. He
would walk the floor at home, plan his articles, think out his
sentences, and send everything to the printer just as he had written it
first,—but when he came to correct the proof he would erase and
interline until the article had passed almost beyond the power of
recognition. His finishing touches were a new creation.
Of course the poor printers never said anything either solemn or
wise at such times, especially when driven to the final point of
desperation. But they could not get mad at him, and there was no
use trying. Dan said,—
“He would just as soon shake hands with a man dressed up as I am
now, with this old suit of overalls on, and sit down and talk with him
as with the richest man in town.”
“The men knew this, and saw and felt his power. He looked at the
man, and not at the clothes?”
“Yes, that is just it.”
Mr. Blaine’s business and home-life are so blended, it is impossible
to separate them. He never left his business at the office. It was all
hours and every hour with him, except upon the Sabbath.
He took some time to look after the education of his children,
something as his father and grandfather had dealt with him. But Mrs.
Blaine, having been a teacher, took this responsibility upon herself.
They all attended the public schools of the city, and were early sent
away to academy, college, and seminary. The home always had an
air of intelligence. Busy scenes with books were common, day and
night. Materials for writing, papers, magazines, and books for
general reading, and for review, seemed omnipresent. There is order
and system amid all the seeming confusion.
Mrs. Blaine’s hand and touch are felt and seen everywhere. She is a
large, magnificent woman, a born queen, as fit to rule America as
Queen Victoria to rule England. She has a quiet, commanding air,
with nothing assumed or affected about her. A gentle, wholesome
dignity makes her a stranger to storms, and her clear, strong mind
makes her ready and at home in society. She is not a great talker,
and encourages it in others by listening only when it is sensible. She
is too wise and womanly to ever gush, and never encourages talk
about her husband. There is nothing patronizing about her.
The fact is, the presidency, since the death of Mr. Garfield, and the
terrible ordeal through which they then passed, has been very
serious business to them. They have not labored for it. It has been
thrust upon them,—for they are one in every sympathy and every
joy.
About a year ago, while calling upon his old friend, Ex-Gov. Anson P.
Morrill, Mr. Morrill said,—
“Are you going to try for the presidency again, Blaine? Come, now,
tell me, right out. I want to know.”
“No, sir,” was the reply. “I do not want it. If you could offer it to me to-
night, I would not accept it. I am devoted to my book at present, and
love it, and do not wish to be diverted from it.”
Mr. Morrill went on to say, that “eight years ago, when they tried to
nominate him at Cincinnati, I was opposed to it, and told my
neighbor, Mr. Stevens, I would not vote for him. I thought he was too
young, and had not grown enough.”
“Well, how is it now?”
“O, he is all right now, well-developed, solid, and strong. The nation
can’t do better than put him right in. He will make a master president,
and give the country an administration they will be proud of.”
This shows the honor and honesty of the old governor, and that he
loved the nation above his friend. The happy, blessed, prosperous
years of home-life ended on Green Street, when Mr. Blaine was
advanced to the third office in the nation, as speaker of the House of
Representatives in congress,—and they removed to the larger
home, with ampler grounds, on State Street, next to the capitol. Here
they have since resided, except when living in Washington. Mr.
Blaine loves home, and has his family with him.
There is nothing extravagant about the home on State Street, either
in the house or its furnishing. It is plain, simple, and comfortable. The
sitting-room and dining-room upon the right of the main hall, and the
two parlors on the left are thrown into one, making two large rooms,
which have always been serviceable for entertaining company, but
never more so than since his nomination for the presidency. The
hallway extends into a large, new house, more modern in
appearance than the house proper, erected by Mr. Blaine for his
library, gymnasium, etc. Mr. Blaine is careful about his exercise, and
practises with dumb-bells, takes walks, rides, etc.
He has a large barn for horses, and generally keeps a number of
them. The house is of Corinthian architecture, without a trace of
Gothic. Corinthian columns, two on each side, indicate the old
division of the large room on the left of the hallway into the front and
back parlor, but all trace of doors is removed, and they are practically
one. A large bay-window, almost a conservatory, built square, in
keeping with the house, looks out upon the lawn.
It is, all in all, a very convenient, home-like place, with nothing
pretentious or to terrify the most plebeian who would care to enter,
and they have been there by the score and hundred. Not less than a
thousand friends, neighbors, and visitors were cordially invited to
come in and shake hands with General Logan, when he visited Mr.
Blaine soon after the convention that nominated them, and received
a quiet serenade, declining any public reception.
A bright, important feature of Mr. Blaine’s home is his cousin, “Gail
Hamilton,”—Miss Abigail Dodge,—the gifted authoress. She is an
intellectual companion, and an important factor in the social and
home-life of the family, deeply interested, but with native good grace,
in all that pertains to the honor and welfare of her distinguished
relatives. Books, music, bric-a-brac, abound in their present home.
They do not “fare sumptuously every day,” though feasts of course
there are, but continue in their simple, democratic ways. Eating is not
a chief business in that home. The children are very intelligent, and
minds, rather than stomachs, have premiums on them. When Walker
was a little fellow, long before he could read, less than two years old,
he could turn to any picture in a large book; he knew them all. But
none of them have surpassed, or equalled, their father’s work at
books,—going through those great lives of Plutarch by the time he
was nine years old,—and this we hear from Mrs. Blaine herself. Only
the three younger are at home,—Margaret, James Gillespie, Jr., and
Hattie, who, although she is the baby, wears glasses. She is a wide-
awake and pleasant child, and finds so much of life as is now a daily
experience, a burden rather than a delight. James has many of his
father’s characteristics, it is said. He is a tall, noble, manly fellow,
and, though still in his teens, has been tutoring in Washington the
past winter. Margaret, older than Hattie or James, has achieved a
national reputation by a dexterous use of the telephone at the time of
her father’s nomination. She was the first to receive the intelligence.
She has mature, womanly ways, and is very like her mother, though
the children all resemble their father,—have his strong, marked
features,—unless it may be Emmons or Alice.
Alice was the oldest daughter, and would accompany, with perhaps
other members of the family, Mrs. Blaine herself, at times, back in
the editorial days, upon the press-excursions. Upon those occasions
Mr. Blaine was in his glory, full of facts, full of life, and full of stories.
There was none of the wag or loafer about him; he was never idle or
obsequious; but he knew all about the bright side of things, and
never failed to find it. His own life seemed to light up all around him.
The ludicrous side was as funny as the mean was despicable. He
was very popular among the journalists of the state. He was an
honor to the craft, and they felt it, and easily recognized him as a
royal good fellow,—a sort of leader or representative man. He was
called out when toasts were to be responded to or speeches to be
made, and was the captivating man on all occasions. The crowd
gathered about him. He never would tell a story but that any lady
might listen to it without a blush. They were well selected, and
always first-class, and told in the shortest, sharpest manner possible.
He would never spin a long yarn. It must be quickly told, and to the
point, and have a special fitness for the occasion.
A story that he enjoyed hugely, and could tell with a gusto inimitable,
was of a country-man elected to the legislature, and for the first time
stopping at a large hotel. The waiters were busy, and while he
awaited his turn he observed a dish of red peppers in front; taking
one of them on his fork, he put it in his mouth, and began the work of
mastication. All eyes were turned on him. The process was a brief
one, and he very soon raised his fair-sized hand, and, taking that
pepper from his mouth, laid it beside his plate, and said, as he drew
in a long breath to cool off his blistered tongue, “You lie thar until you
cool!” This was only matched by one regarding a man from the
interior, at a hotel-table in St. Louis, who, observing a glass of iced-
milk on the outer circle of dishes that surrounded the plate of a
gentleman opposite to him, reached for it and swallowed it down.
The gentleman watched him closely, and, with some expression of
astonishment, said simply,—
“That’s cool!”
“Ya-as,” the fellow blustered out, “of course it is; thar’s ice in it!”
Few toasts touch the heart of Mr. Blaine more deeply than the great
toast of the family and of friendship, and one to which he could
respond with the happiest grace and the liveliest good cheer, “Here’s
to those we love, and those who love us! God bless them!”
Mr. Blaine drinks no liquors, not even the lightest kinds of wine, I am
credibly informed by one who was with him on those occasions, and
frequently at his table.
Mrs. Blaine, like her husband, is a great reader, and while a devoted
mother and faithful wife, never neglecting her home, husband, or her
children, has kept herself well informed, and is intelligent and
attractive in conversation.
Old friends say, “I do love to hear Mrs. Blaine talk; she has a fine
mind, is so well educated, and so well informed.”
An old school-mate testifies that she was a fine scholar when at the
academy over the river from her present home, and that she also
studied and finished her education at Ipswich.
She has trained her children with a skill that few mothers could
command. Her children are her jewels, and are loved with a mother’s
affection. They are as stars, while her husband is as the great sun
shining in the heaven of her joys.
The present Augusta home has been, for years, little more than a
summer-resort, to which they have come the first of June. Their
great home has been in Washington. This, for twenty years, has
been life’s centre to them. Here home-life has reached its zenith; its
glories have shone the brightest; it has been at the nation’s capital,
and husband and father among the first men of the nation. Wealth
has been at their command, to make that home all they desired.
They could fill it with the realizations of their choicest ideals, and
friends, almost worshipers, have come and gone with the days and
hours, from all parts of the nation. They have lived in the nation’s life.
They have been in the onward drift and trend of things, ever on the
foremost wave, caught in the onward rush of events. Life has been
of the intensest kind, rich in all that enriches, noble in all that
ennobles. They have occupied a large place in the nation, and the
nation has occupied a large place in them; and yet, though at the
very farthest remove from the quiet, simple life of the cottage or the
farm, it has been an American home; it could be no other with such a
united head, and retains much of the old simplicity. The habits of
early life are still on them, and in nothing are they estranged from the
people.
It has been an experience with them so long, and came on so early
in its beginnings, and gradually, that they have become accustomed
to honor and distinction.
Another home is likely to be theirs in Washington, the crown of all the
others. But in it they will be the same they are now; just as glad to
see their friends, as home-like as themselves, as genuine and true.
Their heads cannot be turned if they have not been, and home in the
White House will be, if in reserve for them, the same dear, restful,
cheerful spot, for the loved ones will be there, and that makes home,
not walls, and floor, and furniture.
Photographs of the family abound at Mr. Blaine’s, all except the
picture of Mrs. Blaine,—she has not had it taken. “They are not true,”
she says, and she brought a half-dozen of her husband, and only
one seemed good, and she admitted it. The others showed, I
thought, how terrific has been the conflict of life with him. They show
him when haggard and worn, and perhaps prove, by her judgment
on them, how consummate is her ideal of the man of her heart. Mr.
Blaine loves the open air. The hammock, seen in the back-ground of
the picture of his house, is soothing and restful to him, and to a man
of such incessant activity rest is very welcome. He was out in the
hammock, as shown in the picture of his home, with his family and
some of his nearest neighbors about him, when the balloting was
going on in Chicago. The third ballot had just been taken when his
neighbor, Mr. Hewins, came on the grounds.
“Well, Charley,” he said, “you don’t see anybody badly excited about
here, do you?”
“Mr. Blaine,” he said, “was the coolest one of the company.”
These lawn-scenes are a part of the home-life, a very large and
pleasant part; for there are no pleasanter grounds in Augusta than
those surrounding Mr. Blaine’s modest mansion.
 XIX.
CHARACTERISTICS OF MR. BLAINE.

N conversation with a leading business man in Maine, the

question was asked, “What are the chief characteristics of
Mr. Blaine?” The man was well situated to know, and well
fitted to comprehend, although he was not the man to
analyze character, except in a general way, and largely from a
business point of view. His answer was,—
“His immense industry; his great enlightenment, and he has always
been a growing man! He has such great force of character, and such
large intellectual power, and then he is such a social man. He knows
so much, and is so interesting in conversation. He will talk to a
peasant so that he will take it all in, and a prince sitting by will enjoy
it.”
Captain Lincoln and his wife, New England people, but from the
Sandwich Islands, where he had been for some five years in charge
of a vessel, called to see him about the middle of June, to pay their
congratulations; and it was pleasant to observe, how, without a trace
of aristocracy, but with a genuine manliness, he sat down just like a
brother, and talked with them of their interests, the Island and ocean
affairs, and observed, “They don’t have any more roast missionary
out there now”; but this was slipped into a sentence that almost gave
a history of the Islands. And as he discussed ocean problems, routes
to Mexico, and different parts of America, North and South, the
captain’s eyes opened with admiration. And it was not a display of
knowledge, but brought out in questions, as to what do you think of
such a project, and in stating a few brief reasons for it, the man’s
information not only cropped out, but burst forth. He seems so full of
it, that when it can find a vent it comes forth in deluge fashion, much
as water does from a fire-plug.
Mr. Blaine never could be a specialist, but must be world-wide in his
knowledge, as he is in his sympathies. Some men are like ponds in
which trout are raised,—small and narrow, serve a single purpose,
and serve it well; but he is more like the ocean,—broad, and grand,
and manifold in the purposes he serves, and deep as well. Mr. Blaine
is not a shallow man. His has not been the skimming surface-life of
the swallow, but rather the deep-delving life of reality and substance.
Deep-sea soundings, both of men and things, have been a peculiar
delight to him.
Curiosity has ever been a secret spring in him. He must know all,
and he would hunt, and rummage, and delve, and search, until he
did. He has the scent of a greyhound for evidence, however abstract,
and he would track it down somehow, “with all the precision of the
most deadly science,” as he did the telegram which Proctor Knott
suppressed. This inborn faculty, which he has developed to a
marvelous degree, has been a mighty weapon of defence to him,
when combinations and conspiracies have been formed against him,
and of the most cruel character, for his destruction. For, let it not be
forgotten, that he has lived through that era of American life when
the great effort was to kill off, politically, the great men of the
Republican party. A rebel congress of Southern brigadiers did their
worst, but the nation applauded as he triumphed.
The same knowledge seems greater power in him than in ordinary
men, or than in almost any other man, because of his great
intellectual force. Just as a dinner amounts to more in some men,
because of greater power of digestion,—just as the smooth stone
from the brook when in David’s sling went with greater precision and
power, penetrating the forehead of Goliath. It is the man and in his
combinations, manner, methods, and the time, and yet all of these
have little to do with it. Force and directness seem to express it all.
Conventionalities are merely conveniences to Mr. Blaine, and when
not such are instantly discarded. Common sense is the pilot of his
every voyage. Everything is sacrificed to this. This, and this alone,
has been the crowned king of his entire career, and all else merely
subjects.
What he has seen in the clear, strong light of his own best judgment,
enlightened by a vast and varied knowledge, he has seized and
sworn to. He has never plundered others of their cast-iron rules; he
had no use for them. Saul’s armor never fitted him. He has delighted
in the fathers’ reverences and laws, though but seldom quotes them.
He has no time or taste for such easy, common methods. He is too
original. And this is one of the strongest features of the man. He is
not simply unlike any other man, but has no need of resemblance.
He has much of the impetuosity and fiery eloquence of Clay, but then
he has more of the solid grandeur of Webster. But then he is too
much like himself to be compared intelligibly with others.
There are great extremes in his nature,—not necessarily
contradictions, yet opposites. He is one of the most fervid men, and
yet one of the most stoical at times, perfectly cool when others are
hot and boiling. He never loses his head. There is never a runaway,
—but great coolness and self-possession when it is needed, and
ability to turn on a full head of steam, when the occasion requires.
Here is the testimony of a scholar and author:—
“One element in his nature impressed itself upon my mind in a very
emphatic manner, and that is his coolness and self-possession at the
most exciting periods. I happened to be in his library in Washington
when the balloting was going on in Cincinnati on that hot day in
June, 1876. A telegraph-instrument was on his library table, and Mr.
Sherman, his private secretary, a deft operator, was manipulating its
key. Dispatches came from dozens of friends, giving the last votes,
which only lacked a few of the nomination; and everybody predicted
the success of Mr. Blaine on the next ballot. Only four persons
besides Mr. Sherman were in the room. It was a moment of great
excitement. The next vote was quietly ticked over the wire, and then
the next announced the nomination of Mr. Hayes. Mr. Blaine was the
only cool person in the apartment. It was such a reversal of all
anticipations and assurances, that self-possession was out of the
question except with Mr. Blaine.
“He had just left his bed after two days of unconsciousness from
sunstroke, but he was as self-possessed as the portraits upon the
walls. He merely gave a murmur of surprise, and, before anybody
had recovered from the shock, he had written, in his firm, plain,
fluent hand, three dispatches, now in my possession: one to Mr.
Hayes, of congratulation; one to the Maine delegates, thanking them
for their devotion; and another to Eugene Hale and Mr. Frye, asking
them to go personally to Columbus and present his good-will to Mr.
Hayes, with promises of hearty aid in the campaign. The occasion
affected him no more than the news of a servant quitting his employ
would have done. Half an hour afterward he was out with Secretary
Fish in an open carriage, receiving the cheers of the thousands of
people who were gathered about the telegraph-bulletins.”
This power of self-control seems to be supreme. It is just the
particular in which so many of our great men, and small ones too,
have miserably failed. This enables him to harness all his powers
and hold well the reins,—to bring all his forces into action when
emergency requires, and send solid shot, shrapnel, or shell, with a
cool head and determined hand.
Mr. Blaine has a great memory. Nearly all who know him will speak
of this. He seems never to forget faces, facts, or figures.
Thirty years after he attended school in Lancaster, Ohio, he went
there to speak. It was, of course, known that he was coming, and an
old acquaintance of the town, whom he had not seen all these years,
said, “Now I am going to station myself up there by the cars, and see
if he will know me. They say he has such a wonderful memory.”
Several were looking on, watching the operation. Mr. Blaine had no
sooner stepped off from the train than he spied him, and sang out at
once, “Hello, John, how are you!” and a murmur of surprise went up
from those who were in the secret.
At another time he was near Wheeling,—my informant thought it was
across the river from Wheeling,—in Belmont County; he met a man
and called him by name. The man said, “Well, I don’t know you.” Mr.
Blaine told him just where he met him, at a convention, and then the
man could not remember. That night he told some of his friends
about it, and they said it was a fact; they were with him, and saw him
introduced to Mr. Blaine and talk with him, and not till then did the
man remember him.
As General Connor, ex-governor of Maine, who appointed Mr. Blaine
to the United States senate, said: “He could do a thing now as well
as any other time.”
“Governor Connor was in Washington,” he went on to relate, “and
called upon Mr. Blaine when he was secretary of state, and he said,
in his familiar way, ‘Now you talk with Mrs. Blaine awhile,’ and went
into his study. In about an hour he called him, and all about his table
were lying sheets of paper on which he had just written. It was his
official document on the Panama canal, and which he read to the
governor. It had been produced during the past hour, and appeared
in print, with scarcely a change. It came out in a white heat, but it
was all in there ready to be produced at any time.”
The General remarked, “This one characteristic of the man, and an
element of his popularity and hold on others, is this close confidence
he exercises in his friends, of which the above is an illustration.”
And this touches at once another feature, and that is his ability to
read character, and so to know whom to trust. He goes right into a
man’s life, when he gets at him.
While out riding, during the preparation of his volume, with his wife,
two or three miles from Augusta, in Manchester township, he got out
to walk, and finding a farmer in a field near by, he stopped, talked
with him some time, asked him about his history, his ancestors, and
found out pretty much all the man knew about himself, and could
have told whether it would do to leave his pocket-book with the man
or no. Such a thing is a habit with him, and keeps him near the
people, gives him a look into their minds, a peep into their hearts, as
well as a view of their history.
Character-readers usually are persons of strong intuitions. They see
not so much the flesh and blood of the individual, as the soul within.
Just giving one sharp, quick, penetrating look at the man in the
concrete, and the abstract question is settled; the man is rated; his
value written down. It is not so much a study as a look,—thought
touches thought, mind feels of mind. It is power to know clearly,
quickly, strongly, and certainly, with him. He does not have to eat a
whole ham to find out whether it is tainted, nor drink an entire pan of
milk to find out whether it is sweet.
Mr. Blaine is very obliging, and he can usually tell an opportunity
from a chance. Life is no lottery to him; he keeps his feet on the
granite, and gives all “fortuitous combination of atoms” the slip, being
too discriminating to invest. One day he was in the old Journal office,
now owned by Sprague and Son,—a very kind and considerate firm,
who are producing a sprightly daily,—when a citizen entered who
had just been appointed clerk of the Probate Court, and asked the
gentleman to go on his bond. Mr. Blaine spoke up at once, “I will do
it,” and then said it reminded him of a story, which he proceeded to
tell:—
“Governor Coney lived in Penobscot, shire-town of Penobscot
County, and was judge of the Probate Court. The sheriff of the
County had failed, and Mr. Sewall, a citizen, met Judge Coney and
said, ‘The sheriff has failed, and you and I are on his bond.’ ‘Well,
that’s good,’ said the judge, ‘I guess you can fix it up.’ ‘O, but my
name is on the left-hand side, as a witness to his signature.’ So the
unlucky judge was left to contemplate the delightful privilege of
paying what amounted to a rogue’s bail.”
This same clerk of the Probate Court of former years, but still a
friend and neighbor, a man, however, with an unhappy physical
disability, came upon the lawn when the large committee to notify
him of his nomination were gathered there to perform that duty, and
as the man told me, Mr. Blaine caught sight of him off some
distance, and “notwithstanding all those men were there, he spoke
right up in his old, familiar way, ‘How are you, ——?’”
It shows his genuineness and simplicity. There is enough to him
without putting on any airs. It could not be otherwise than that a
nature so highly wrought and intense, should be possessed of the
powers of withering scorn and just rebuke, and when the occasion
required, could use them. There happened such an occasion in
1868.
General Grant had been invited to attend the opening of the
European and North American Railway, at Vanceboro’, in the State
of Maine. It formed a new connecting-link with the British Provinces.
There was a special train of invited guests, and as General Grant
was then president, and had never been in the state before, it was
quite an honor to be of the company. Mr. Blaine was, of course, of
the number, as were the leading citizens without respect to party. A
newspaper-correspondent, without any invitation, got aboard the
train, and went with the party, and on his return reported that
President Grant was drunk. This cut Mr. Blaine to the quick, because
of its untruthfulness, and as he was a Republican president, and
politics usually ran high in Maine during the palmy days, from 1861
to 1881, when Mr. Blaine was at the helm, and also because the
president was guest of the state. Not long after, he met the reporter
in the office of Howard Owen, a journalist of Augusta.
“And if you ever saw a man scalped,”—I use the exact language,
—“and the grave-clothes put on him, and he put in his coffin, and
buried, and the rubbish of the temple thrown on him forty feet deep,
he was the man. I never heard anything like it in all my born days:
philippics, invectives, satires, these common things were nowhere.”
“Well, what did he say?”
“What didn’t he say?” was the reply,—“‘You were not invited, you
were simply tolerated; you sneaked aboard, and then came back
here and lied about us,’ etc.”
But sixteen years had effaced much, and yet the impression was
vivid, as the man’s very expressive manner betokened.
And a leading Washington correspondent, conversant with all the
sights at the capital, says, “It would look strange to see him with the
whiskey-drinking crowd at either bar in the capitol building. He does
not visit them, and he does not drink.”
The great-heartedness of Mr. Blaine comes out in his book, “Twenty
Years in Congress,” and shows how large are his sympathies. He
devotes over fifteen pages of that great work to an historical
vindication of Brig. Gen. Charles P. Stone, who was the victim
chosen to atone for the Ball’s Bluff disaster, in which Col. E. D.
Baker, of California, a most gallant officer, lost his life. It is a deeply
interesting portion of the seventeenth chapter.
Mr. Blaine is a great lover of fair play. He is too great to cherish any
feeling of resentment, for he is true-hearted as well as great-hearted.
In this same chapter he presents Mr. Roscoe Conkling very
handsomely, and does him the honor to quote more extensively from
his speech than from Chandler, Lovejoy, Crittenden, Richardson, or
Thad. Stevens, although Conkling was younger than any of them.
The Republican party is like a great family to him, and he loves and
cares for all, in the sense of valuing them highly for their principles’
and works’ sake, and so studies the things that make for peace,—
but not peace for peace’ sake, but for the sake of principle.
He asks no quarter for himself, but will follow out the behests of his
great nature in the interests of others, and the great cause through
which his life has run, like a thread of purest gold. It is his great
friendliness which has enabled him to take others into his very life,
and live and toil for them so largely. He seems ever living outside of
self,—going outside of self and entering into their cause and
condition, and making their case his own. He aims to know enough
about those within his reach so that he shall be interested in them,
and can think and feel intelligently regarding them. His whole nature
acts in unison, just as heaven designed. His mind must know, and
his heart must love, and his will must act, while conscience detects
and demands purity of motive.
This honor makes life a joy, a melody, a delight, and so resonant with
constant notes of praise. He cannot be idle; this is against his nature;
and to be vicious would give him pain. He is not mean, or low and
truckling, but large and open as the day.
An old Democrat, who had known him ever since he landed in
Augusta, said, when asked a point-blank question about him as a
man, “He is a good neighbor and a great citizen,” and this man had
had many dealings with him, but he could not escape the