Having a strategic plan is one thing, but the other half of the equation is of course the implementation of the plan and for the entrepreneur, implementation is at least as important as the development of a sound strategy, and indeed for many entrepreneurial firms, superior execution can be the strategy, so let’s look at what the best entrepreneurs know about strategic execution.

There is a strong individualist bent in American culture and the myth of the triumphant individual is deeply ingrained in the American psyche, and whether it is midnight Rider Paul Revere or Basketball’s Michael Jordan, we are a nation enamored of heroes. But the more you look at the history of business, government, the arts, and the sciences, the clearer it is that few great accomplishments are ever the work of a single individual and our mythology refuses to catch up with our reality.

For example, who painted the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel? It was the famous Renaissance artist Michelangelo right? Actually, this misconception is a result of our individualist cultural mythology, as we know now from historical accounts that Michelangelo actually worked with a group of more than 13 artists in painting the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.

Our mythology continues to promote the triumphs of the great individual at the expense of the Great Group or team, but the group is the vehicle how the world actually gets changed today, and in a society as complex and technologically sophisticated as ours, the most urgent projects require the coordinated contributions of many talented people, as there are simply too many problems to be identified and solved and too many connections to be made for any one person to deal with.

Even as we make the case for collaboration, we resisted the idea of collective creativity, but many great entrepreneurs throughout history have understood the limitations and dark side of the hero mythology, and instead, they have systematically organized genius and the power of Great Groups and getting their visions brought to life. And this is the precise skill and discipline you must practice if you expect to bring your strategic plan to life, as your only chance is to bring people together from a variety of backgrounds and disciplines who can be frank about a problem through the prism of complementary minds allied in common purpose.

Every Great Group is extraordinary in its own way, but a study put forth by Warren Bennis who wrote “Organizing Genius” suggests 10 principles common to all, and that apply as well to their larger organizations, and these principles not only defined the nature of Great Groups, they also redefine the roles and responsibilities of leaders, and to be sure, Great Groups rely on many long-established practices of good management including effective mediation, exceptional recruitment, genuine empowerment, and personal commitment.

At the heart of every Great Group is a shared dream and all Great Groups believe that they are on a mission from God, that they could change the world, make a dent in the universe and they are obsessed with their work, as it becomes not a job but a fervent quest, and that belief is what brings the necessary cohesion and energy to their work. They manage conflict by abandoning individual egos to the pursuit of the dream, so conflict, even with diverse people, is resolved by reminding people and each other of the mission.

All Great Groups seem to have disdain for their corporate overseers and all are protected from them by a leader and not necessarily the leader who defines the dream, and this duality of administration can be found in all Great Groups, along with one other important trait in all cases, physical distance from headquarters helped a great deal.

Even the most noble mission can be helped by an onerous opponent which has literally been true in many projects that had enemies both real or invented, as most organizations have an implicit admission to destroy an adversary, and that is often more motivating than their explicit permission, for example, Apple computers implicit mission was to bury IBM (remember the famous 1984 Macintosh TV commercial that included the line, “Don’t buy a computer you can’t lift.”), and the decline of Apple in years since have followed the subsequent softening of their mission.

All successful entrepreneurs inevitably view themselves as the feisty David, hurling fresh ideas at the big, backward looking Goliath, and world changing groups are usually populated by Mavericks, people at the periphery of their disciplines, and the sense of operating on the fringes gives them a “don’t count me out” scrappiness that feeds their obsession.

Membership in a Great Group isn’t a day job; it is a night and day job, and divorces, affairs, and other severe emotional fallout are typical, so such groups strike a Faustian bargain for the intensity and energy that they generate. On one hand, they are all non-hierarchical and very egalitarian, and yet they all have strong leaders, and that’s the paradox of group leadership, since you cannot have a great leader without a Great Group, and vice a versa, and in an important way, these groups made the leaders great. The leaders studied were seldom the brightest or best in the group, but neither are they passive players, but they were connoisseurs of talent, more like curators than creators.

Cherry picking the right talent for a group means knowing what you need and being able to spot it in others, and it also means understanding the chemistry of a group, as candidates are often grilled, almost hazed, by other members of the group and its leader. You see the same thing in great coaches, as they can place the right people in the right role, and get the right constellations and configurations within the group.

Youth might provide the physical stamina demanded at times by these groups, but Great Groups are also young in their spirit, ethos, and culture, and most important, because they’re young in spirit, group members don’t know what’s supposed to be impossible, which gives them the ability to do the impossible, as Great Groups don’t lack the experience of possibilities.