Being a strategic leader requires that you first understand corporate priorities and future agendas as well as have a clear direction on how you can contribute to it in a value-added way. Being an active supporter of the organization’s strategy is only one element of strategic leadership. There are two other very important elements.

Go back a few years and think about the things you did on a daily basis to get results and achieve goals. Would you say your daily tactics, assignments, projects are the same today as they were five years ago? In most cases people I talk to said no. In my own work, while some of the tactical aspects of my job have remained, almost every other aspect of my job is different. Now, think about what duties your job will require in the future. One year, three years, or five years from now, will you be doing the same things you are doing today? Probably not.

The Senior Leadership Team is the crux to successful strategy execution within any organization. A great team can take a flawed strategy and turn it into something really exciting, but a dysfunctional team can wreak havoc on the best strategy in the world. In CMOE’s 30 years of experience in helping organizations around the world, we have seen that a quality leadership team is the catalyst that drives change and propels the organization through difficult or seemingly impossible obstacles.

Recently, one of our clients scheduled a 1-day workshop in Milwaukee, WI, USA. And as usual, our facilitator was traveling to the client’s site a day prior to the planned workshop date. While the weather was clear in Atlanta, Georgia, USA, where our facilitator was departing from, the weather in Milwaukee was about to turn ugly. At approximately 3:00 pm, my client called to tell me a big storm was in route that would potentially bring 4 inches of snow to Milwaukee. At this point my client and I began to put into practice some everyday strategic thinking. We laid out a few different scenarios we could do in order to carry out the training.

In order to successfully position your organization in the marketplace, leadership teams must create a compelling and distinctive value proposition. Customers must believe you are there to champion their needs, not just to make a profit. However, defining a really attractive value proposition is actually the easy part. The hard part is getting the organization totally aligned and in sync with a customer focused value proposition. Everyone in the organization must understand and see that the customer is part of their personal responsibility. This customer-oriented culture relies on front line leaders that help people understand how they fit into the strategic management of the business and why they matter.

In order for your organization to achieve market leadership development, a focused, first class strategy is required. Leadership within the organization must create a truly compelling and distinctive value proposition under this strategy that will cause customers to seek you out in an over-crowded, competitive field. Forming a really attractive value proposition is often the easy part. The harder part is creating a customer oriented culture to support the proposition. You can master the art of improving the value of your products and services and become a very tough competitor, but it is simply impossible to achieve market leadership without being effective in the discipline of customer intimacy. Let’s face it, most of us know those suppliers and vendors whom we refuse to work with because of the poor response we receive when problems develop.

A few years back, a friend of mine was laid off from his high paying corporate job. Prior to this, he was living the good life, as they say. A very expensive home, a new luxury car, vacations to the best places, and it seemed as if my friend had money growing on trees. I was very happy for him.

We are often asked the question what is the end result of applying strategy on a day to day basis. Through extensive research and development, we have discovered that great strategic thinkers in any job or at any level learn how to nurture these skills. They avoid being seduced and succumbing to the activity addiction. Good strategic thinkers develop their skills by practicing and hunting “small game” such as projects, assignments, and team issues. Later, many assume key corporate positions or become political leaders or military strategists on a much larger scale.

Igniting The Strategic Spark In Others

If the whole purpose of leadership is to leverage talent and achieve results through the efforts of others, then leaders have a very special stewardship when it comes to igniting the strategic spark in others. Leaders who understand the essence of this part of leadership have a golden opportunity to mine strategic ideas and capitalize on strategic actions of others. All it takes is a willingness to teach and motivate others about how to think and operate strategically. This in turn creates an organization that is prepared and ready to seize opportunities and head off catastrophes, which translates into better operating results down the road. But there is a tradeoff; it does require an upfront investment, discipline, and a skill set that unfortunately are foreign to some leaders.

Okay business people, I am going to step away from the normal focus on work and talk a little bit about my previous experience as a college football athlete and the way I was introduced to strategic formulation.

When I played high school football, my team had a lackluster win-loss record, but I still have dreams about how we could have been a lot better had our coaches implemented more strategic formulation and planning to prepare us for our competition each week. I also think it would have been beneficial if they could have spent more time teaching us how to be more strategic about the mental part of the game, versus just the physical part of the game.