o. No-one has ever seen a strategy or touched a strategy. Every strategy is an invention, a figment of some people’s imagination, or lack thereof. Rendering it on paper or a screen does not make it real, let alone interesting.
o. Strategies are to organizations with blinders are to horses: they keep them going in a straight line, which can impede their peripheral vision, where treats might appear.
o. While strategic planning is supposed to be a regular, systematic process for change, typically to make five-year plans on an annual basis, most of the time, organizations should get on with pursuing the strategies they already have. [EN PETERIAN vs PORTERIAN effectiveness. or REF Blog 13 July 2018] Think of the process instead as typically quantum: long periods of strategic stability interrupted by shorter bursts of strategic change, in fits and starts. Of course, this can distract management from recognizing when changed has become necessary, but so too can relentless strategic planning numb management to change that is sneaking up on the edges.
o. SWOT is a premise of strategic management : a compamy has to assess its strengths and weaknesses (or “core competences”), as well as the threats and opportunities in its environment, in order to develop strategies. I have been party to many discussions of strengths and weaknesses: they are inevitably empty—like a …. How can you know these strengths and weaknesses without testing them first, in other words, learning what they are. That’s why I believe the assessment of strengths and weakness should be replaced by the assessment of successes and failures—what really has worked and hasn’t.