Is it possible to look ahead without stumbling over what’s in front of you? All too often companies spend precious time laying out long term strategic plans, only to discover that their maps are out of date in a month. Business strategy expert Martin Reeves offers a solution.
He advocates transitioning from relying on a single "classical" approach to strategy and moving towards a more tailored and dynamic approach to strategy and execution. One approach to strategy does not fit all. There can be no 'universal strategy'. The approach to strategy has to match the situation, the problem, the challenge, the goal.
Here are some examples of winning strategies for some different situations we encounter in today's business world. For technology companies, the approach is to experiment, select, scale up and iterate. For innovative biotech entrepreneurs, the mantra to strategy is to envision, create and exploit the situation. For digital industry, the approach to strategy is about influencing, collaborating, orchestrating and co-evolving to create an ecosystem to reshape an industry.
The question you want to ask is not which approach would work for your business? But what approach would work for that part of the business at that specific time? It's got to be a dynamic approach to winning.