"disincentives to thinking strategically" might be broken down a bit (rewards missing for strategic thought, points of pain for trying, points of pain for succeeding despite X). And better strategic thinking is less "thinking" than a series of conversations and experiments with the world.
It's not too hard to make the leap from his historical examples to modern technology products, IMHO. The key point is defining "guiding policies" that lead to actions addressing your diagnosis. You'll know you've defined the right strategic policies when actions naturally flow.
The three points themselves aren't particularly groundbreaking, it's just the formula of including all three as the basis of a good strategy that works so well.
Read a modern product book (eg Pichler's Strategize or Cagan's Inspired) and read through the examples with that formula in mind. The connection will probably jump off the page for you. Conversely, when I read some other product stories (37Signal's HEY comes to mind), I can see the holes and where things might have gone wrong.
I just finished another strategic assessment for a tech company this week following Rumelt's model. It's awesome to watch the lightbulbs go off around the room. Even when you're asking for big changes, starting with the diagnosis (and supporting data) then laying out the path forward through the policies and actions is so powerful. I don't use those labels, of course, but the structure is all there.
Thank you. From 20+ years in the Big Tech world: strategy requires critical examination and diagnosis, and those are disciplines too often dismissed by leaders more interested in their position than in the group's performance. And thus we move blindly to constructing pillars (most often with new words for old thoughts.)
I think the product leader meant "reactive" (acting in response to a situation) and not "reactionary" (opposing political or social progress or reform.)
If even 20% of the time effort and resources allocated for creating "productivity" go into creating "clarity", our working lives would be so much better.
"We don't have time to plan". I see stress and frustration levels rise when I try to encourage people/teams to stay in the strategic thinking space. And it's mostly because of what you point out in your article, particularly the bias towards action, so I concur.
The other thing I notice is that leaders can find it confronting to being in the strategic space. My view is that's where they should be, but it's hard right. It demands thinking, researching, debating, dialoguing. It feels in active compared to being a "doing / execution machine". Leaders find it easy to "do", harder to "think". I'm not excusing this behaviour, I've just noticed it a lot in the consulting and coaching work I do.
Strategy implies being informed and the competencies to understand now and discover what's ahead to inform now and future paths. Time and space is often not provided for the reflective practices required to do this meaningfully. Leading to enormous waste.
I think I’m squarely in #1: not enough time / fatigue. I have a rough cut at diagnosis, and because the company is output focused, necessarily immediate actions. But missing the guiding policies, and more importantly others in the org with the time and incentives to develop this further and discuss.
On the other side, I realize what I’ve been tasked with is just a piece of a larger puzzle (I hope). Which I appreciate #3 in how to change course perhaps starting with my area and eventually the broader company.
"disincentives to thinking strategically" might be broken down a bit (rewards missing for strategic thought, points of pain for trying, points of pain for succeeding despite X). And better strategic thinking is less "thinking" than a series of conversations and experiments with the world.
I would be interested in your sharing an example of a "good strategy"
Read Rumelt's Good Strategy, Bad Strategy. It will change your world.
I read that, but I still think the book lacks modern, extensive examples of formulated , read world strategies
It's not too hard to make the leap from his historical examples to modern technology products, IMHO. The key point is defining "guiding policies" that lead to actions addressing your diagnosis. You'll know you've defined the right strategic policies when actions naturally flow.
The three points themselves aren't particularly groundbreaking, it's just the formula of including all three as the basis of a good strategy that works so well.
Read a modern product book (eg Pichler's Strategize or Cagan's Inspired) and read through the examples with that formula in mind. The connection will probably jump off the page for you. Conversely, when I read some other product stories (37Signal's HEY comes to mind), I can see the holes and where things might have gone wrong.
I just finished another strategic assessment for a tech company this week following Rumelt's model. It's awesome to watch the lightbulbs go off around the room. Even when you're asking for big changes, starting with the diagnosis (and supporting data) then laying out the path forward through the policies and actions is so powerful. I don't use those labels, of course, but the structure is all there.
Will Larson does a really good job here for engineering strategies. https://lethain.com/eng-strategies/
Thank you. From 20+ years in the Big Tech world: strategy requires critical examination and diagnosis, and those are disciplines too often dismissed by leaders more interested in their position than in the group's performance. And thus we move blindly to constructing pillars (most often with new words for old thoughts.)
I think the product leader meant "reactive" (acting in response to a situation) and not "reactionary" (opposing political or social progress or reform.)
If even 20% of the time effort and resources allocated for creating "productivity" go into creating "clarity", our working lives would be so much better.
"We don't have time to plan". I see stress and frustration levels rise when I try to encourage people/teams to stay in the strategic thinking space. And it's mostly because of what you point out in your article, particularly the bias towards action, so I concur.
The other thing I notice is that leaders can find it confronting to being in the strategic space. My view is that's where they should be, but it's hard right. It demands thinking, researching, debating, dialoguing. It feels in active compared to being a "doing / execution machine". Leaders find it easy to "do", harder to "think". I'm not excusing this behaviour, I've just noticed it a lot in the consulting and coaching work I do.
Strategy implies being informed and the competencies to understand now and discover what's ahead to inform now and future paths. Time and space is often not provided for the reflective practices required to do this meaningfully. Leading to enormous waste.
Based on your post John, do you think companies should have 1 strategy or multiple (company, product and team)?
I think I’m squarely in #1: not enough time / fatigue. I have a rough cut at diagnosis, and because the company is output focused, necessarily immediate actions. But missing the guiding policies, and more importantly others in the org with the time and incentives to develop this further and discuss.
On the other side, I realize what I’ve been tasked with is just a piece of a larger puzzle (I hope). Which I appreciate #3 in how to change course perhaps starting with my area and eventually the broader company.