"I want to stress, it’s perfectly cool to not have a strategy."
This might be a question of semantics but …
Every business has a strategy. The question is whether or not they have a intentional, cohesive, and well-communicated strategy. Most have an unintentional strategy, which makes long-term success very difficult to achieve.
As you said, businesses can survive without articulating their strategy or even realizing they have one at all. But they will generally increase their gains and long term survival prospects by dialing it in.
Even if a company does intentional strategy poorly the first, second, or third time around, the incremental learning will slowly drive results. Unless they're just terrible at running their business, in which case they're destined to fail anyway.
Fair point. When we talk about "creating" strategies there's an implication that it's done right.
As Richard Rumelt put it, it's a question of good strategy versus bad strategy. There's a spectrum ranging from unintentional and highly fragmented to intentional and cohesive.
When I'm helping companies lay out a strategy I find it helpful at times to outline the weak strategy (or strategies) they've been operating under. That illuminates what's been organizing their efforts and what needs to change.
"I want to stress, it’s perfectly cool to not have a strategy."
This might be a question of semantics but …
Every business has a strategy. The question is whether or not they have a intentional, cohesive, and well-communicated strategy. Most have an unintentional strategy, which makes long-term success very difficult to achieve.
As you said, businesses can survive without articulating their strategy or even realizing they have one at all. But they will generally increase their gains and long term survival prospects by dialing it in.
Even if a company does intentional strategy poorly the first, second, or third time around, the incremental learning will slowly drive results. Unless they're just terrible at running their business, in which case they're destined to fail anyway.
If it's unintentional and uncohesive I would not call it a strategy, because it should be intentional and cohesive to be a strategy.
Otherwise, anything you do will always be a strategy. As long as you do something, we can cal label it as a strategy.
You have a list of goals? It's a Ssrategy
You have a plan to achieve 100 goals? You've got a strategy.
The whole point is that your strategic thinking behind the strategy is explicit. As otherwise, how can you execute based on the strategy?
Fair point. When we talk about "creating" strategies there's an implication that it's done right.
As Richard Rumelt put it, it's a question of good strategy versus bad strategy. There's a spectrum ranging from unintentional and highly fragmented to intentional and cohesive.
When I'm helping companies lay out a strategy I find it helpful at times to outline the weak strategy (or strategies) they've been operating under. That illuminates what's been organizing their efforts and what needs to change.