Everything about strategy
Now I am going to tell you all I know as a strategist. Thereafter, we can keep delving into this through hundreds of other posts...
What does it mean to win?
If strategy is the discipline of victory, the very first question to be answered is what you are seeking to achieve. Dreams, goals, challenges, aspirations… Somehow we, as strategists, are always flirting with a desired future, aren't we?
Existential anguish
Does it mean that our current situation isn't enough? Well, it seems that as human beings we are never fully satisfied with our present.
Limited resources set against limitless ambitions bring about a constant tension. Strategy arises from this encounter: the lived life (so far) and the unlived life (still to come).
Whenever you feel the past pushing and the future pulling, strategic thinking awakens.
Stratos Agos
It requires conscious effort to achieve valuable outcomes.
Commanding the squad… Since the Greeks, from whom the word originates, strategy has been related to leading (agein, ἄγειν) a force (stratos, στρατός), to mobilising power for realisation.
You will be leading some ‘friends’ against some ‘enemies’. You will be leveraging advantages to gain an edge. You will be bringing your best to overcome your worst.
Whatever the specific context in which you are acting - military, business, games, science, technology, environment, culture, society, investments, government - there you find those who are with you and those who are against you. That's life. Life demands strategy.
Coup d’œil
You are immersed in your time-space context. Your only chance is to get some perspective. To look outside. To see inside.
Like Napoleon, you must develop a coup d’œil to see what no one else sees or, at least, to see it before someone else does.
Ok, not all fields are strictly competitive. But even when it comes to cooperation, everybody needs a vision to direct their efforts. Tell me, anyhow, where are we going and what are we supposed to realise?
Stories and domains
Strategy is a narrative, the story you tell yourself and others about how the next chapters of your life will (or should) look. It narrates where you are going, why and what for.
It's a story with specific promises: the outcomes of your efforts, described in terms of a set of domains - spaces of potential gains and benefits based on the advantages you believe you possess.
Opportunities are open doors… Capabilities are the means to walk through them… A strategic domain is built when you link these two aspects of the narrative: what is the challenge & how can we overcome it? Where to play & how to win? What do we want to do & how should we achieve it?
Tell me about your chosen domains and I’ll tell you whether you've convinced me to follow you, to help you or to invest in you.
Portfolio of investments
Balancing. No investor would - or even could - allocate without taking on risk.
Big ambitions, high goals, disruptive innovation. What's your risk appetite?
Fast execution, quick accomplishments, accelerated realisation. What's your timing?
No good story was ever linear. Linearity is boring. And false. A good story strikes a good balance between drive and control, curiosity and answers, danger and prudence, breakthrough moments and integrative thread. All across a timeline.
Roadmap of initiatives
To engage all of your friends in the adventure, you have to translate the narrative into a script. All actors must fulfil their roles, coordinated throughout each scene to give the story life.
When we say ACTION! we need to maintain clarity, coherence and consistency, otherwise people lose track. The more appealing it is, the more exciting it becomes.
Learning by doing
Good performance comes from many rehearsals. So don't be afraid to experiment and reinvent - strategy is an ongoing journey.
A good strategist will never get stuck in too much analysis. It is indeed about choices, but it is also about making things happen while continuing to understand the ever-changing context. You get better by doing it.
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So, tell me: what is success for you?
What’s your story for the future to come?
What are you doing to bring this future to reality?