Being Strategic – Some Defintion

Being strategic is easy to say yet tough to put into practice. I just read a blog post from Kevin’s Remarkable Learning Blog about a new book on strategy. Okay, there are 1000s of books about strategy. Like Kevin, I’ve read quite a few. Most leave me scratching my head wondering what I just read and why I wasted my time. While the book by Erika Andersen mentioned in the post is not yet released, I think it has potential because of an easy to understand definition of strategy:

Being strategic means consistently making those core directional choices that will best move you towards your hoped-for future.

So many strategists focus on the importance of planning. My home community recently spent a ton of cash working with a strategic consutling firm on developing a strategic plan for the community. This process has taken over a year and is still not done. No actions yet. I read a near-final draft of the plan. Too much fluff. Over 100 pages. Difficult to implement.

It’s frustrating to watch this process fail time and time again. Is there a better way? The folks at I-Open implement a practice of “strategic doing“. I’ve had a chance to talk to Ed Morrison, meet with Larry Taylor, and interact in a Future Indiana discussion with Betsey Merkel of I-Open. Their approach is so simple and opposite conventional wisdom. But it works. Betsey has been on me to start my own strategic doing, and all I’ve given her are excuses and reasons to delay. I’m ready to step up and work with the I-Open team. I think the above mentioned definition is a good way to explain strategic doing.

Once I read the book, I’ll let you know if it’s worth it.