Commander's intent.
A plan rarely survives contact with reality intact. What survives is intent, clearly understood, so that people can adapt the method without losing the outcome.
In the Army you learn quickly that a plan rarely survives contact with reality intact. Conditions change, information is incomplete, and the people executing are rarely the people who wrote the plan. What survives contact is not the plan. It is intent, clearly understood.
Commander's intent is a simple idea with enormous consequences. You tell people the purpose and the desired end state, the why and the what, in terms clear enough that they can make good decisions about the how when the situation changes and no one is available to ask. It is the opposite of scripting every step.
Why scripts fail in the enterprise too
Most transformation plans are scripts. They specify the steps in detail and assume conditions will hold. When conditions change, and they always do, the people on the ground face a choice: follow a script that no longer fits, or improvise without knowing what outcome they are improvising toward. Both are bad, and both are common.
Give those same people a clear intent and the calculus changes. They can adapt the method while holding the outcome, because they understand what the outcome actually is and why it matters. They stop waiting for permission and start exercising judgment in the direction you wanted.
Tell people the outcome and the why, clearly enough that they can decide the how when you are not in the room.
Intent is what makes delegation safe
Leaders hesitate to delegate execution because they fear losing control of the outcome. Commander's intent is the answer to that fear. It is the mechanism that lets you push decisions down to the people closest to the work without losing the thread, because everyone is anchored to the same end state.
An organization full of people who understand the intent executes faster and adapts better than one full of people waiting to be told the next step. The first kind closes the execution gap on a thousand small decisions a day. The second kind escalates them, and escalation is just delay wearing a tie.
Write the intent before the plan
Before the detailed plan, write the intent. What is the outcome, why does it matter, and what does done actually look like. Make it clear enough to survive being repeated down three levels of an organization. The plan will change. If the intent is clear, the outcome can survive the change.