Are you living by lies
The other day I got an insightful bit of feedback on one of these essays from a client (hi Alan), and it really got me thinking. He said: “This is consistent with your philosophy that great strategies are revealed as truths in and of themselves, and not created by the whims of the strategist” Now […]
Can a person have a strategy like a business?
One of my favourite concepts is the difference between expertise and strategic ability: Expertise = knowing things Strategic ability = knowing how things interact You can be extremely knowledgable and yet useless strategically because you can’t grasp the dynamics that lie between the things you know; and conversely you can be totally ignorant and yet strategically insightful, […]
The how cascade – where goals end and strategy begins
Of all the strategic sins one could commit, there are few more heinous than the confusion of “goals” with “strategy”. Fortunately it’s so bad that it’s become something of a cliché. You don’t need to know an awful lot about the field to recognise that “becoming number 1”, or “doubling our revenue”, or “pursuing excellence”, […]
What my strategy documents look like
One question new clients tend to ask when we begin working together, is “what do I get at the end of this?”. Naturally, they get a strategy – and all the ensuing clarity, growth, fame and fortune that goes with it. But that’s not really what they mean. What they mean is what actual “thing” […]
Glossary of strategic ideas – volume 2
The following, as suggested by the title, is an update to my old post cataloguing various strategic hacks, tricks, and thought experiments. The article and old items are the same as before, but I’ve added a bunch of new ones – which I’ve highlighted for people who read the original already. Hope it’s of use, stay […]
The opposites game: how to tell if a strategy is nonsense
By my conservative estimate, about 90% of business strategies are, when you get down to it, exactly the same. They use different words, different rationales, different techniques, different frameworks, but beneath it all the actual content, the actual meaning, is identical. What is this universal mega-strategy of which I speak? Simply this: “Be good” That’s […]
The most simple strategic framework
I’ve made a song and dance in the past about my aversion to templates, models, frameworks, and the like in order to generate strategy. None, I believe, can be said to perfectly match every possible strategy – and in some cases they can even drag people away from perfectly good solutions, simply because they weren’t […]
Strategic unity: how to blend the functional with the emotional
I often say that the best businesses are generic in every way but one. In amongst a framework of safe and recognisable best practice, they have a single disarming insight which subverts the status quo, and from which all their leverage stems. In my case, although I dress everything up to appear distinctive, there really […]
Does the military have anything to teach us about strategy?
I’m going to level with you here, I’ve not actually read Sun Tzu’s The Art of War. I know, I know, what kind of strategist am I? A pretty poorly read one, truth be told. I did not learn my craft “top down”, through careful study of canonical texts and Harvard Business Review papers, but […]
Minimum viable strategy: the art of leaving things alone
The other day I was introduced to a lovely idea which I’m sure will resonate strongly with anyone who has to do something “creative” for a living: The Queen’s Duck. It comes from the development of a video game, Battle Chess, and more specifically a moment of ingenuity on behalf of one of the animators […]