Every executive knows strategy is vital. But what many overlook—until it’s too late—is that strategy doesn’t fail on paper. It fails in execution.
And execution doesn’t fail because of weak ambition—it fails because of insufficient capability.
“An organisation cannot operate at a level higher than its current capability.”
This is the uncomfortable truth that many transformations overlook.
We pour money into new systems, structures, and strategies—only to watch them stall. Not because they were wrong, but because the organisation wasn’t ready to implement or sustain them.
What Do We Mean by Capability?
Not just skills. Not just resources. Capability is the organisation’s collective capacity to execute, adapt and sustain change across key areas like leadership, technology, customer experience, operating model, culture, and collaboration.
In other words:
Capability is what enables—or blocks—transformation success.
You can have a world-class strategy and still fail because:
- Your culture resists change.
- Your leadership is misaligned.
- Your teams lack clarity on how to deliver value differently.
- You’ve outpaced your systems or decision-making models.
Executives Often Miss This
Many senior leaders are fluent in the language of ROI, performance, risk and efficiency—but “capability” is often seen as an HR issue, not a core business risk.
That’s where transformation efforts derail.
The DMI Changes That
The Digital Maturity Index (DMI) is a capability diagnostic grounded in Unitary Development Theory—a scientifically validated model of organisational growth. It helps organisations:
- See the real barriers to change
- Understand their actual readiness to transform
- Prioritise the capability shifts that unlock results
- Develop a roadmap for strategy / transformation execution success.
When organisations diagnose capability before executing strategy, the success rate increases exponentially. The right strategy, delivered by the right capability, in the right sequence. That’s Execution Excellence.
Want to talk about what this looks like in your organisation?
Let’s talk about how the DMI and the Accelerating Transformation Readiness workshop can give you a roadmap based on reality—not assumption.
Call me at 083 654 6480, or set up a time that suits you in my calendar.