Have you tried the Systemic Planning workshop?

The missing link between strategy, culture and execution

The Real Problem Isn’t Commitment—It’s Behavior

A few days ago, I facilitated a Systemic Planning workshop with a client’s amazing teams—multiple teams, over fifty people, all aligning on ambitious goals. The energy was high, leaders committed to bold objectives, and everyone left feeling motivated and more importantly with a clear and measurable plan. Yet, I couldn’t help myself to think that the real test wasn’t in the content itself, but in the behaviors that would follow – something that I remind myself every time I’m running this workshop with different organizations.

This workshop with these amazing teams reminded me of some key thoughts and principles that I want to share with you: Execution doesn’t fail due to lack of commitment—it fails when team behaviors, decision-making loops, and systemic patterns contradict those commitments.

Most planning processes focus on what needs to be done, but Systemic Planning focuses on how teams actually operate as a system and within a system. It bridges the gap between strategy and execution by making invisible forces—team interactions, micro-decisions, and execution patterns—visible and changeable.

When teams remain unaware of their own systemic patterns, they unknowingly reinforce behaviors that hinder execution. But when systemic planning brings these patterns to light—showing how they impact performance—they can consciously shift towards more effective collaboration.

It takes more energy to fail than to succeed……

The Hidden Challenge: Why Teams Fail to Execute What They Plan

Most organizations don’t struggle because they lack a clear strategy. They struggle because their execution behaviors and culture don’t align with their strategic intent. Planning often gives the illusion of progress—teams set ambitious goals, define key actions, and commit to execution. Yet, when the time comes to deliver results, they find themselves stuck in the same inefficiencies, bottlenecks, and miscommunications that have always been there.

The Real Issue: Misalignment Between Strategy and Execution Culture

Execution doesn’t fail because of bad plans. It fails because of systemic patterns that contradict them.

• Teams say yes to big goals, but their existing ways of working don’t support those commitments.
• Decisions are made in planning sessions, yet day-to-day interactions often undermine those decisions.
• Teams operate with invisible barriers—micro-decisions, internal politics, and old habits that slow execution down.

So the problem isn’t that people don’t want to execute. It’s that they’re unaware of how their behaviors, decision-making loops, and team dynamics are working against them. 

Most teams operate on autopilot, reinforcing patterns that create friction, misalignment, and wasted effort.

3 Parallel Layers That Shape Execution

To bridge the gap between planning and execution, teams must shift their focus beyond just setting goals. They need to understand the three systemic layers that influence execution:

1. The Content Layer – The “What”

The structured elements of planning—content, goals, priorities, dependencies, risks, and actions—that teams define in strategy meetings. The problem is that many teams believe that if they have discussed content, brainstormed solutions and actions, and created a detailed Gantt chart, execution is guaranteed. However, without behavioral alignment and a shared way of working, these efforts remain theoretical, leading to plans that look good on paper but fail in practice.

2. The Inter-Human Processes Layer – The “Interaction”

The invisible team behaviors, interactions, and decision-making patterns that shape results. Here the problem is that most teams don’t reflect on how they collaborate, communicate, or make decisions. They assume strategy will naturally translate into action, and it is enough to brainstorm. 

3. The Visibility Layer – The “Where Are We Misaligned?”

The mechanisms that make execution gaps visible—tracking progress, exposing contradictions, and adapting in real time. The problem here is that without clear visibility, misalignment remains hidden until it’s too late.

Organizations that don’t address these layers waste enormous energy on failure—not because they lack talent, but because their teams operate in ways that hinder their results. The paradox is that it takes more effort to fail than to succeed. The friction, rework, and delays caused by systemic misalignment are exhausting. The real opportunity isn’t just to plan better—it’s to create a planning process that actively reshapes team culture and execution behaviors in real time.

Systemic Planning: The Process That Reshapes Culture and Execution

Systemic Planning shifts the focus from “what we need to do” to “how we operate as a system,” making execution a natural outcome of aligned behaviors. This process unfolds through three key steps:

1. Exposing Systemic Patterns That Shape Execution 
2. Moving From Static Plans to a Live System 
3. Making Execution Misalignment Visible and Actionable.

Step 1: Exposing Systemic Patterns That Shape Execution
Every team operates within predictable patterns of decision-making and action. These patterns either reinforce execution or create friction and delays. The key to effective planning is not just setting goals but revealing how existing behaviors support or block those goals.

Common execution blockers:

• Teams commit to ambitious goals but unknowingly reinforce patterns of indecision and slow execution.
• Planning sessions produce clear action lists, but daily micro-decisions erode alignment and momentum.
• Hidden systemic patterns—such as hierarchical bottlenecks, territorial thinking, or lack of ownership—prevent teams from operating effectively.

Systemic Planning helps teams recognize these patterns before they derail execution. Instead of assuming that objectives will translate into action, it creates real-time awareness of how execution behaviors influence outcomes.

Step 2: Moving From Static Plans to a Live System
Traditional planning follows a linear approach—teams create a roadmap, distribute tasks, and expect execution to follow. But in complex environments, execution is not linear; it is dynamic, adaptive, and shaped by ongoing interactions.

Systemic Planning transforms planning into a live system by:

• Ensuring that execution is co-created by the teams who will deliver it.
• Embedding decision-making roles to prevent stagnation and execution gaps.
• Enabling real-time course correction by continuously exposing where teams are misaligned.

Planning is no longer just about defining the future—it becomes an active behavioral process that aligns execution in real time.

Step 3: Making Execution Misalignment Visible and Actionable
It actually takes more energy to fail than to succeed.

Teams experience friction not because they lack competence, but because they lack visibility into the systemic gaps slowing them down.

Systemic Planning introduces practical mechanisms to expose and fix misalignment:

• Decision Accountability – Who makes which decisions? Where do bottlenecks form?
• Commitment Tracking – What was agreed upon? How are behaviors aligning with execution?
• Execution Health Checks – Are teams operating in a way that supports strategy, or are unseen dynamics derailing progress?

When teams can see the impact of their own behaviors, they can self-correct, adapt, and execute faster.

The Shift: Planning as a Culture-Shaping Practice

The real power of Systemic Planning is that it reshapes culture, not just execution.

• It moves planning from a static event to a continuous systemic process.
• It transforms execution from a series of individual efforts into a collective intelligence system.
• It ensures that strategy doesn’t just sit in a document—it lives in the way teams operate daily.

By embedding Systemic Planning, organizations don’t just plan better; they create a culture where execution happens naturally, alignment is continuous, and performance improves systemically.

In the next section, we will explore how to apply this approach to different leadership levels—ensuring that both teams and executives drive execution in a systemic way.

The Viral Effect: When Planning Becomes a Self-Sustaining Execution Process

Most planning initiatives start strong, filled with enthusiasm and alignment. But over time, the initial momentum fades, execution stalls, and planning becomes just another ritual with little impact. This is because most organizations treat planning as a one-time alignment event rather than a continuous, self-sustaining execution process.

Systemic Planning creates a viral effect by embedding execution-enabling behaviors into team culture. Three key mechanisms drive this:

1. Execution Becomes an Adaptive System – When teams experience planning as a behavioral framework rather than a checklist, execution naturally follows.Instead of relying on forced compliance, teams develop a self-correcting loop where planning continuously shapes how work gets done.
2. Cross-Team Visibility Creates Systemic Accountability – When teams and leadership openly track execution behaviors and decisions, the need for micromanagement fades. Shared real-time insights ensure that misalignment surfaces early and teams naturally course-correct before execution stalls.
3. Planning Evolves Into a Collective Habit – When teams integrate systemic planning principles into their daily ways of working, execution habits evolve organically. Teams begin to preemptively identify and fix execution gaps, eliminating the need for last-minute firefighting.

The Ripple Effect Across an Organization

When systemic planning becomes embedded in an organization, its impact extends beyond individual teams. The behaviors, decision-making patterns, and execution rhythms set in one part of the organization start to influence others. What begins as a single shift in planning culture spreads naturally, creating an organization-wide transformation where execution excellence is the norm rather than the exception

From Executive Teams to Delivery Teams – When executive teams model systemic planning behaviors, it cascades down into mid-level management and front-line execution teams.Leaders who shift from “command and control” to “systemic facilitation” create space for teams to take ownership of execution.

From One Team to Multiple Teams – When one team successfully applies systemic planning, neighboring teams observe the impact and replicate the behaviors. The viral effect expands beyond isolated teams, creating system-wide execution improvements.

From Planning Cycles to Continuous Execution – Planning stops being a disconnected event and becomes an ongoing real-time execution alignment system. Organizations shift from reactive problem-solving to proactive course correction as a continuous practice.

How to Lead & Facilitate Systemic Planning at All Three Layers

Systemic Planning is not just a framework—it is a behavioral transformation process. To sustain its impact, leaders and coaches must actively facilitate the shift at all three systemic layers (content, inter-human processes, visibility)

For Coaches & Facilitators: Driving Systemic Awareness

On the Content Layer – Help teams translate strategy into structured execution pathways—ensuring clarity around goals, dependencies, risks, and commitments; Challenge teams to go beyond the “what” and ask, “What behaviors will sustain execution?”

On the Inter-Human Process Layer – Facilitate sessions where teams actively observe their own behavioral patterns—where execution slows down, where misalignment occurs; Introduce decision-making clarity—who owns which decisions, how information flows, and where bottlenecks emerge; Reinforce motivational circularity—ensuring that teams don’t just comply with a plan but take ownership of systemic execution.

On the Visibility Layer – Design transparency mechanisms (Where does execution break down? How can teams measure progress systemically?);  Implement execution health checks—periodic team reflections on behaviors impacting execution outcomes; Encourage data-driven course correction, making team performance visible in a non-punitive, learning-driven way.

For Executives & Leaders: Creating the Conditions for Systemic Execution

On the Content Layer – Set the expectation that planning is about execution behavior, not just alignment; Ensure that goals and priorities are co-owned by execution teams, not just handed down from leadership.

On the Inter-Human Process Layer – Move from directive leadership to systemic facilitation—enabling teams to align, adjust, and execute without top-down micromanagement; Foster an environment where misalignment surfaces early and becomes an opportunity for adaptation, not a blame cycle; Enable distributed decision-making, reducing reliance on leadership for every course correction.

On the Visibility Layer – Demand real execution visibility, not just status reports—what’s actually happening versus what’s being presented; Ensure teams track not just progress, but systemic behavioral patterns affecting execution outcomes; Create a culture of real-time adaptation—where teams proactively address misalignment rather than waiting for failures to emerge.

A Culture of Execution Excellence

When teams fight against their own systemic inefficiencies, execution becomes exhausting – Systemic Planning removes these inefficiencies by embedding execution-driven behaviors into team culture.

Leaders and coaches who facilitate Systemic Planning don’t just improve planning sessions—they reshape how organizations operate at every level. Execution becomes a self-reinforcing cycle, where alignment, ownership, and adaptation happen naturally.

The greatest shift organizations can make is to stop treating planning as a theoretical exercise and start embedding it as a behavior-driven, systemic execution discipline.

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Viorel Bucur is the co-founder of Upscale Paris and The Scale Project podcast.

Entrepreneur and Team Coach (ICF) with over a decade of experience in behavioral sciences, organizational systems, and tech entrepreneurship, he helps leaders and organizations navigate digital transformation, AI adoption, and organizational change.

Passionate about human potential and leadership development, Viorel is dedicated to shaping the next generation of conscious and high-impact leaders, guiding them through transformational journeys that redefine the way they work, learn, and lead.