Strategic Thinking

Strategic Thinking is a planning process that applies innovation, strategic

planning and operational planning to develop business strategies that
have a greater chance for success.
Strategic thinking is the ability to see the total enterprise, to spot the trends
and understand the competitive landscape, to see where the business needs
to go and to lead it into the future.

More and more organizations are learning that past experience is not
always the best basis for developing future strategies. Executives need to
thoughtfully consider how to create value for customers.

Strategic Thinking-isthe"What"andthe
"Why"...thatiswhatshouldwebedoingandwhy.
Strategic Planning-isthe"How"and"When"...ata
veryhighlevel.

At the foundation is self-awareness, which arises from the ability to think

critically, along with an intellectual openness. Those, in turn, provide the
basic business skills including decision-making, problem-solving, and a
solid grasp of both the business and the customers it serves.
The higher one rises in an organization, the more these skills are needed.
And as they are developed, they build the next layer up the ability to
embrace change and ambiguity, and in so doing create something new and
different. That, in essence, is strategic thinking.
But it all starts with critical thinking. And those who cant master the basics
dont go far in an organization.

 Intellectual curiosity : A desire to

learn more about a person , thing or
way of life.
Mental Flexibility: is the ability to
see the things from different
perspective and ready to accept the
change around you.
Intuition: the act of knowing or
seeing without the use of rational
processes.
System Thinking: Systems thinking
has been defined as an approach to
problem solving, by viewing
"problems" as parts of an overall
system, rather than reacting to
specific parts, outcomes or events
and potentially contributing to
further development of unintended
consequences

Features of Strategic Thinking

Strategic Thinking is a broader and more innovative way of
thinking on a daily basis about the overall goals of your job,
team, and organization.
It is also disciplined thinking with a focus first on the desired
outcomes of your entire business as a system and then on the
relationships between your organizational components along
with constant feedback about results to find points that best
achieve your desired outcomes.
It helps you clarify your goals, desired outcomes, or
vision that you want the whole system to achieve, along with
constant feedback vs. the desired outcomes.
It allows the relationships and fit of the parts and pieces to
each other to be supporting, not hindering, achievement of the
whole It leads to a powerful synergy of people working
together to achieve the same common goals of a vision in a
better and superior way.

Five elements of thinking strategically

Intentfocused
Asystemsperspective
ThinkinginTime
IntelligentOpportunism
Hypothesis-driven

1.Intentfocused
Strategic intent provides the focus that
allows individuals within an organization to
marshal and leverage their energy, to
focus attention, to resist distraction, and to
concentrate for as long as it takes to
achieve a goal.
This concept implies the act of turning
your mind toward an outcome or object.

2.Asystemsperspective
Think ecosystem. So, to get good at strategic thinking, you
need to try to understand the way your world works and how
that affects you. Because you cant really know everything,
youll have to take your best shot at gathering the right
information and prioritizing the components of systems that
are most likely to affect the way you work now and into the
future.
While you might be an expert in interpreting the particular
business ecosystem in which you operate, how well do you
understand what is happening culturally or politically that
might also influence your future?
Read a lot. Explore new things. Talk to people outside your
organization and outside your discipline as well as the people
who know your system the best.

3. ThinkinginTime
Having seen the future that we want to create, what
must we keep from our past, lose from that past and
create in the present to get there?
When you think strategically, you are always
connecting the past to the present to the future. You
learn from the past and use that learning to make
predictions. You look at the present to assess the gap
between where you are now and where you want to
end up.

4.IntelligentOpportunism
Well, SWOT thinking never ends for strategic
thinkers. Strategic thinkers are able to spot and react
to great new opportunities as they arise. They
understand that the world is dynamic and they are
open to change to reach their vision.
Intelligent opportunism also implies that you dig deep
into your organization to hear from many
perspectives. Ideas and knowledge are valuable
wherever they exist but youll need to look and
listen to benefit from them.

5.Hypothesisdriven
strategic thinking mirrors the scientific method it
is both creative and critical in nature.
As strategic thinkers, we create hypothesis, those
questions that start What if? or If then?
questions that enable us to imagine multiple scenarios,
analyze them as best we can based on the knowledge
weve accumulated and then test the best hypotheses
(experiment). As we act, we learn from our experience
to create new hypothesis for future action.

Need/ Importance for strategic thinking

The purpose of Strategic Thinking is to create a
strategy that is a coherent, unifying, integrative
framework for decisions especially about direction of
the business and resource utilization.
To do it, Strategic Thinking uses internal and external
data, qualitative synthesis of opinions and
perceptions. It is conscious, explicit, and proactive
and defines competitive domain for corporate
strategic advantage.
Strategy is a key outcome of a relevant strategic
thinking process.

TheStrategicThinkingProcess

 Strategic Thinking is the combination of Innovation,

Strategy Planning, and Operational Planning.
The process begins with Innovation. We try to create
the ideal future and consider the plans needed to
achieve them and to see them through. Innovation
helps us to move outside our comfort zone into the
possibilities
of
exceeding
customer
and
organizational requirements and expectations.
Innovations are then articulated into a series of
strategies. This is a part of the entire Strategic
Planning process. However, in Strategic Thinking, we
incorporate the needs of our customers, the
organization and our staff in the process. We
incorporate Benchmarking to ensure that industry
best practices are included in our vision of the future.

 Employee Involvement at each stage of the Strategic Thinking

process is key to ensuring that they stay involved in the
execution of the Operational plans. This is where Operational
Planning comes to play. It is the process of taking the
strategies (the outcomes of the Strategic Planning process) and
developing them into action plans that are achievable and
involve staff throughout the organization in ensuring that the
needs of the customer and the organization are met.

The last part of Strategic Thinking is Measurement.

There must be an on-going process of measuring the
effectiveness of the plans and verifying that they are
implemented as planned. Measurement is also used to
benchmark the original needs against the
implemented actions

 To successfully implement strategic change, initiated

through the strategic thinking process, it is important
for all levels of employees to fully incorporate the
change in everything they do. We do this by
identifying and establishing Values and Principles to
ensure the organization is successful at achieving its
strategic goals.

Strategic Thinking Vs. Strategic Planning

Strategic Thinking

Strategic Planning

Vision of the Future

Only the shape of the

future can be predicted.

Strategic Formulation
and Implementation

Formulation and
implementation are
interactive rather than
sequential and discrete

The roles of formulation

and implementation can
be neatly divided

Managerial Role in
Strategy Making

Lower-level managers
have a voice in strategymaking, as well as
greater latitude to
respond
opportunistically to
developing conditions.

Senior executives obtain

the needed information
from lower-level
managers, and then use
it to create a plan which
is, in turn, disseminated
to managers for
implementation.

Control

Relies on self-reference
a sense of strategic
intent and purpose
embedded in the minds
of managers throughout
the organisation that
guides their choices on a
daily basis in a process
that is often difficult to
measure and monitor
from above.

Asserts control through

measurement systems,
assuming that
organisations can
measure and monitor
important variables both
accurately and quickly

ManagerialRolein
Implementation

All managers understand

the larger system, the
connection between their
roles and the functioning
of that system, as well as
the interdependence
between the various
roles that comprise the
system.

Lower-level managers
need only know his or
her own role well and
can be expected to
defend only his or her
own turf.

StrategyMaking

Sees strategy and

change as inescapably
linked and assumes that
finding new strategic
options and
implementing them
successfully is harder
and more important than
evaluating them

The challenge of setting

strategic direction is
primarily analytic.

ProcessandOutcome

Sees the planning

Focus is on the creation
process itself as a critical of the plan as the
value-adding element.
ultimate objective.

6 Critical Success Factors

Critical Success Factor 1:Move out of your comfort zonetodays
paradigmsand use new and wider boundaries for thinking,
planning, doing, evaluating, and continuous improvement.
Critical Success Factor 2: Differentiate between ends (what) and
means (how).
Critical Success Factor 3: Use all three levels of planning and results
(Mega/Outcomes; Macro/Outputs; Micro/Products).
Critical Success Factor 4: Prepare all objectivesincluding the Ideal
Vision and missionto include precise statements of both where you
are headed, as well as the criteria for measuring when you have
arrived. Develop Smarter Objectives.
Critical Success Factor 5: Use an Ideal Vision (what kind of world, in
measurable performance terms, we want for tomorrows child) as the
underlying basis for planning and continuous improvement.
Critical Success Factor 6: Dening need as a gap in results (not as
insufficient levels of resources, means, or methods).

Critical Success Factor 1: Shifting

Paradigms

the ways of thinking

that led to success yesterday can become a major barrier to creating future
success. The new realities require managers and leaders at all levels to change
how they think about how the following can or should contribute to results that
add value:
1. The elements of organizational performance.
2. The role of the organization in societythere are two bottom lines
(and these are high payoff results).
3. The role of leaders (that is, the leader as a steward, not authoritarian
or parent).
4. The process for strategic thinking and planning.
5. The factors that influence human performance.
6. The way problems are defined and the decision process (for example,
level of participation).
7. The methods for creating and managing profound change successfully.
Effective strategic thinking and planning require everyone to shift their paradigms
and agree on common destinations. This means that many people at all
levels in an organization must usually unlearn previous ways of thinking and
performing.2 They then must learn better ways to achieve desired/required
performance.

CriticalSuccessFactor
Two.:Distinguish Between Ends
and Means

Distinguishing between ends and means

is another
characteristic of a strategic thinker.
Results are ends that define in
measurable terms
the future we want to create. Means are
the methods and tactics we choose to
achieve the results.

CriticalSuccessFactorThree:Link Mega, Macro, and Micro

Use and link all three levels of planning and

results. Each level of results focuses on a different, but related, client category.
The chart below shows this relationship.

Planning Level

Client Category

MEGA Results These results are

called
OUTCOMES

The client is society now and in the

future.

MACRO Results These are results

are called OUTPUTS

These results delivered to direct

clients
outside of the organization.

MICRO Results These results are

called
PRODUCTS

These are results delivered to

internal
clientsteams or individualswho
add value.

CriticalSuccessFactorFive.
:Ideal Vision
It is critical that strategic thinking and planning
begin by stepping outside the limits of your organization.
This step involves representative
stakeholders in answering some fundamental questions
about the
sort of world you would like to create for tomorrows child.
The Ideal Vision expresses in measurable terms what we
wish to accomplish
and commit to design and create.3 It describes ends and
not means,
processes, procedures, resources, or methods.

CriticalSuccessFactor
Six.:Needs Are Gaps in Results
Define needs as a gap between present results
and desired results, not as perceived gaps in
inputs and/or processes (which
are really wants). By defining needs as gaps in
results, we are thinking strategically,
because we are designing the long-term future
to be accomplished
before deciding what methods and means might
create it.