Strategy Process

Geoff Ball & Associates
Enabling people to work Together BETTER
Geoff Ball & Associates, 164 Main Street, Room 210
Los Altos, CA 94022, Phone 650-941-1497, ghball@aol.com

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PROCESS FOR DEVELOPING STRATEGY

DRAWING ON OTHER'S WORK	The process described below is derived from several sources. Since Business Strategy has been much worked on over the last 50 years, it makes sense to collect together the best of what we have found and at the same time keep it in the background until it is needed. We have used, with modifications and additions, the Process outlined in Simplified Strategic Planning by Robert Bradford and Peter Duncan for the Planning portion of this process. The book is an excellent resource with many tips and ideas and examples. We have used a number of the ideas from Execution by Larry Bossidy and Ram Charan in Execution Phase. We have also linked this Strategy work to Organizational Dilemmas as a key viewpoint for developing Strategy.
WHAT WE ADD TO WHAT IS OFTEN DONE	IN ADDITION -- It's fair to ask what we bring to the strategy work. Our facilitation experience described elsewhere on this website (See the Facilitation Page) provides us with skills and understanding that help top teams work effectively together. We have collected good questions to ask and topic-specific charts and diagrams to support the teams thinking and collaboration. The use of large wall charts -- some based on templates and some free form -- enables the Strategy Team to see connections and infer implication that are much more difficult to see working from text lists alone. (See Graphics with Groups.) The use of Dilemmas Thinking provides conceptual power in managing the inherent tensions that can cripple an organization if not managed well (See Dilemmas Overview).
THE PROCESS	The following process is linear in the sense that the Strategy Team can proceed through it in the order listed. However, usually there is jumping back to revisit what has been worked on based on things learned later in the process.

INTENT
	Focus	Intuitive sense of opportunities and corresponding capabilities that provide a focus for the organizations activities; within INTENT this is the result of utilizing the 'strategic mindset'. For startups this is the period at the begining - the germ of an idea that can infect others with excitement and a sense of possibility. For established companies this is re-examining the current intent and considering changes.	In what I call the mind of the strategist, insight and a consequent drive for achievement, often amounting to a sense of mission, fuel a thought process which is basically creative and intuitive rather than rational. Kenichi Ohmae
	Boundaries	Values	Values provide both constraints and direction for our actions. Values can incorporate dilemma like tension.
	Guidelines	Operating Principles	These often imply specific strategies.
PLANNING
	Data	External context, internal context, capabilities and competencies
	Ideas	Assumption
	Analysis	Strategic assessment, Strategic issues, Ways we can shoot ourselves in the foot.	Strategists do not reject analysis... they use it only to stimulate the creative process, to test the ideas that emerge, to work out their strategic implications. Kenichi Ohmae
	*Direction*	Strategies - the allocation of organizational resources to accomplish the INTENT.
	Commitment	Vision Statement including Purpose, Mission, Values, Vivid Description, General Operating Principles, Goals, and high level Objectives	Note that the formulation of the complete vision statement comes later in the process. It is the result of the earlier work. The work on INTENT provides sufficient clarity as to direction to do the planning up to this point.
	Dilemmas	Alignment /\ Empowerment; Centralization /\ Decentralization; Cost /\ Quality; and others as relevant.
EXECUTION
	Implementation	The three way relationship of the People Process, the Operations Process and the Strategy Process. Specific Objectives.
	Monitoring	Both retrospective and prospective metrics related to the organization
	Enhancing capability	Reviewing existing capability and capacity against that needed by the strategies. Developing strategies and tactics to move toward "instrumental goals and objectives" - closing the gap between what exists and what is needed.