Strategic Thinking – What is it?
Much of my work with my clients is with their strategic thinking, and the work always starts with “What is strategic thinking is your organisation?” Very often, there is a remarkable lack of clarity about what strategic thinking actually is:
- Is it the ability to envision a future different from the current situation?
- Is it the ability to get others excited about that vision?
- Is it an ability to figure out how to get from where we are to where we want to be with theresources we have at our disposal?
- Is it a skill? A talent? Something you’re born with? Something you can learn?
- Is it the ability to keep the organisation on track despite a chaotic business environment?
It is all of those things. But maybe it is less than that.
The definition that works for me is this:
Strategic thinking is the discipline of noticing and responding to potential game-changers in order to have the advantage even in an uncertain and chaotic business environment.
So what are the potential game changers?
How Are Strategic Thinkers Different?
I’ve made the point that the strategic thinker is disciplined and somewhat neurotic (in a good way). So what sets the truly strategic thinker apart from the rest of us? I think it is that the strategic thinker most frequently looks into the future and has an awareness of things in the present that could bring about change in the future. This is the natural propensity of some personalities and also shows up in terms of tests of brain dominance. However, if you are not naturally future-oriented then you have to learn the skill and establish the discipline.
Contact Me
If you recognise that you need to start developing your strategic thinking skills and disciplines, email me on [email protected] and let’s discuss your coaching programme.
- Do you have a pocket of excellence in your organisation which, if replicated throughout, would set your business in a league of its own? Do you have a sales team that really cooks? What are they doing that is different from the other sales teams? You can pretty much bet that they have a system that they are using with relentless discipline, and this is why they produce results. Could you replicate this system in your other sales teams? How could you do this? Noticing these pockets of excellence, thinking through how they can be replicated and implementing such a strategy of replication is a great example of strategic thinking in action.
- Do you have a particular advantage over your competitors? A technology they don’t have? A relationship with another industry or organisation that they don’t have? Were you first to market? These provide you with a window of opportunity that will not be open for ever. The most essential characteristic of all strategic thinkers is that they are never complacent. In fact, they’re rather neurotic. They see potential danger around every corner and they execute strategies that mitigate the dangers.
- Is there something going on in your business, your industry or the economy that you don’t understand? This is a potential game changer. What you don’t know or understand can hurt you. The strategic thinker will simply not accept that nobody knows what’s going on and nobody understands how this works. The strategic thinker recognises the risk of not knowing, and will wrestle with the issue until she does understand – and when she understands, she will act on the basis of this understanding. Either she will understand the risk that must be mitigated or she will understand the opportunity that must be taken – and execute appropriate strategies in response.
- Are you trying to realise a particular vision for your business? Achieving that vision means that you need to decide where the business will dedicate energy and resources and where it will not. What you decide to do and not do is a potential game changer and takes courage – the courage to not do things that you have always done, or which your competitors do, in order to spectacularly well those things that will set you apart. Making this choice is strategic thinking in action.
- Has your division been asked to deliver a particularly challenging set of results – even impossibly challenging? The strategic thinker is the quintessential problem solver – he believes that for every challenge there is a response that will turn that challenge to their advantage. He believes that those results can be delivered if only he and his team think about it cleverly and execute their strategy diligently. This is the meeting point between being strategic and operational – the strategic thinker changes what he does operationally in order to ensure the execution of the strategy. The notion that you are either strategic or operational is rubbish – a strategy that does not show up clearly in the way the business operates is nothing but a dream.
How Are Strategic Thinkers Different?
I’ve made the point that the strategic thinker is disciplined and somewhat neurotic (in a good way). So what sets the truly strategic thinker apart from the rest of us? I think it is that the strategic thinker most frequently looks into the future and has an awareness of things in the present that could bring about change in the future. This is the natural propensity of some personalities and also shows up in terms of tests of brain dominance. However, if you are not naturally future-oriented then you have to learn the skill and establish the discipline.
Contact Me
If you recognise that you need to start developing your strategic thinking skills and disciplines, email me on [email protected] and let’s discuss your coaching programme.
