A Classic Strategy Sinker: The Sacred Cow

You can have the boldest growth strategy in the market - but if your people are still running the same reports, sitting in the same meetings, and following the same outdated workflows, your strategy is already compromised.

TL;DR

The biggest threat to execution isn’t a bad plan, it’s the survival of legacy processes that quietly drain time, budget, and momentum. In mid-sized businesses, where every resource counts and there’s no integration office to enforce discipline, these sacred cows don’t just slow you down - they can sink the strategy entirely. The good news: with the right framework, you can find them, kill them, and free your team to focus on what actually drives growth.

The Problem: Growth Strategies Often Die in the Shadows of Legacy Processes

When a business announces a new strategic direction (e.g. digital transformation, entry into a new market, a post-acquisition integration, or a turnaround plan) the big-picture goals tend to get the spotlight. Slide decks are polished, vision statements are updated, and leadership rallies the organization.

But in the background, a silent drag persists: the sacred cows. These are processes, programs, or traditions that have survived not because they deliver measurable value, but because they are familiar, politically protected, or simply “how we’ve always done it.”

Bain & Company notes that in most corporate transformations, up to 20% of ongoing activities could be stopped with no material impact on performance - yet they persist, consuming budget, headcount, and leadership attention (Bain, 2022).

In a mid-sized business, the stakes are higher:

• Capacity is finite. Every hour and dollar spent on non-growth activities is an hour and dollar not spent on executing the new strategy.

• No integration office. Unlike Fortune 500 companies or large PE-backed roll-ups, there’s rarely a dedicated transformation team to systematically hunt and retire these processes.

• Leaders are already stretched thin. Most are balancing their day jobs with the demands of change, and the “mental tax” of confronting sacred cows is easy to postpone.

The result? Six months into the new strategy, most employees are still doing the same work they were before and progress stalls.

Why Sacred Cows Survive

McKinsey research on organizational inertia finds that deeply embedded routines can take 18–24 months to naturally unwind without intervention, even in the face of major strategic shifts (McKinsey Quarterly, 2021). Common reasons include:

• Perceived low risk in keeping them. Killing a legacy process creates tension. Leaving it alone feels safer.

• Lack of hard data. Without clear cost-benefit analysis, leaders struggle to justify ending something that “might” be valuable.

• Political capital. Sacred cows often have influential champions who benefit from their survival.

• Invisible opportunity cost. The impact of retaining them is indirect - slower decision-making, diluted focus - making them harder to target.

The Rapid Decision Framework for Retiring Non-Growth Activities

A new growth strategy can’t wait two years for old habits to fade. Drawing from leading portfolio management frameworks, here’s a fast-paced 5-step approach you can implement in under 90 days:

1. Name the Cows

Create a “legacy process inventory” with input from every function. Ask:

• What are the activities, reports, meetings, and workflows that take significant time or budget?

• Which of these have no clear link to the new strategy’s outcomes?

BCG’s research shows that simply cataloging all recurring processes can surface 15–25% that no one can fully justify (BCG, 2020).

2. Quantify Cost and Value

For each process:

• Estimate time spent (in hours × average loaded cost of labor).

• Estimate direct spend (software licenses, vendors, travel).

• Link to measurable outcomes (revenue, margin, customer retention).

If the process can’t be linked to tangible value, it goes into the “review for retirement” column.

3. Score Strategic Fit

Use a simple 2x2: Strategic Relevance vs. Cost/Complexity.

• High cost, low relevance = prime candidates for elimination.

• Low cost, high relevance = keep, but streamline.

4.  Pilot Elimination

Rather than announcing permanent cuts on day one, run time-bound pilots to pause the process for 30–60 days. Track metrics that matter to the new strategy. If there’s no material downside, make the cut permanent.

Deloitte’s transformation playbooks show that piloting removals can cut decision resistance by 50% in change-averse organizations (Deloitte Insights, 2021).

5. Redirect Resources Publicly

When you cut something, be explicit about where that freed-up capacity goes. For example:

“We’ve retired the weekly legacy status call, freeing 15 hours of senior leadership time each month. That time is now allocated to our new market entry war room.”

This turns cuts into proof points that the new strategy is real - and that leaders are serious about funding it.

A Mid-Sized Business Reality Check

In a large enterprise, the “sacred cow hunt” might be run by a transformation office with analysts, PMO staff, and executive sponsorship. In a mid-sized business, it’s different:

• The COO might be the de facto transformation lead, while still managing operations.

• The CFO may have to build the cost-benefit model alone, in between budget cycles.

• The CEO may be trying to hold the vision together while juggling investor updates, customer relationships, and recruiting.

Without a clear, time-boxed framework, killing sacred cows becomes “next quarter’s problem” - and the strategy limps forward, weighed down by legacy.

The 90-Day Sacred Cow Challenge

Here’s an illustrative sprint cadence that works in mid-sized businesses without adding bureaucracy:

Days 1–15: Inventory & Awareness

• Map all recurring processes and routines across functions.

• Share the “why” with leadership: freeing up capacity is part of the growth plan, not a cost-cutting witch hunt.

Days 16–45: Scoring & Prioritization

• Quantify cost and value.

• Apply the 2x2 scoring model.

• Identify 3–5 high-cost, low-value targets.

Days 46–75: Pilot Pauses

• Halt the selected processes temporarily.

• Track agreed-upon KPIs to measure impact.

Days 76–90: Decision & Communication

• Make permanent cuts for processes with no measurable downside.

• Redirect freed resources to high-priority growth initiatives.

• Publicly share wins internally to build momentum.

Why This Matters

Bain’s research on transformation ROI shows that organizations that systematically prune non-core activities during strategy shifts achieve up to 30% faster execution and are twice as likely to hit Year 1 growth targets (Bain, 2022).

For mid-sized businesses - where there’s no integration office to enforce discipline, where leaders are already wearing multiple hats, and where investor patience is finite - sacred cow hunting isn’t just housekeeping. It’s survival.

How Can RLK Help?

At RLK, this is exactly the kind of work we live for. We help mid-sized companies do the hard, messy, politically sensitive work of identifying and retiring the processes, programs, and traditions that no longer serve their growth strategy - without losing the institutional knowledge or cultural glue that makes the business unique.

We don’t just hand you a slide deck; we roll up our sleeves and build the process inventory with you, create the cost-value models, facilitate the tough conversations, and set up the tracking mechanisms so the wins stick.

If your growth strategy is fighting an uphill battle against legacy processes, RLK can help you clear the path faster, cleaner, and with less internal friction than going it alone.