When we are delivering our Business Strategy course – specifically aimed at SMEs and startups – we talk a lot about strategy. What it is, how it works, and what to expect.
We talk about it as a process conisisting of:
- Where am I now?
- Where do I want to be?
- How will I get there?
- How will I know I am there?
Which is a relatively simple structure.
If I told you that you had to be at my house by 7 o’clock this evening, you’d need to know what my address is, where you are or will be in relation to it, and what the route to get there is. Strategy, whether finance strategy, marketing strategy. engineering strategy, or every other strategy, is the same.
- Where am I now?
- Where do I want to be?
- How will I get there?
- How will I know I am there?
Some explanations illustrate this as a set of steps and you take it one easy step at a time. In over 30 years of business, we have never found it to be like that. Business is far more chaotic. It is never, ever a set of easy steps.
Nor is it a straight line.
Often, where you thought you were going is not where you’re actually going, and where you thought you were, you were not.
Sometimes you have to take two steps forwad to go one step back, and sometimes you have to wander around for a bit.
The purpose of any strategic approach, or any project planning, is to put pins in the ground, to fasten things in place, and as far as you can, to reduce the chaos.