Strategic Leadership in Business

So what is a concise explanation of strategic leadership? It is nothing more than the ability to anticipate, prepare, and get positioned for the future. It is the ability to mobilize and focus resources and energy on things that make a difference and will position you for success in the future. It is the courage to think deeply about what you want to do. Applied strategic leadership is about creativity, intuition, and planning to help you reach your destiny. Strategic people think and act before they have to, before they are forced to take up a defensive or reactive position.

As humans, we have the capacity to think broadly and beyond the immediate movement. We can choose and learn how to think consciously and deliberately about the future and the big picture. But unless we change our traditional thinking patterns and develop this thinking capacity more fully, our success will remain mediocre or possibly come to an end.

Real strategic leadership means taking responsibility for the future, as well as for what is happening today. A primary goal of a strategic leader is to gain a better understanding of the business conditions, the environment (the market, customers, and competitors), and the leading indicators that identify new trends and situations that may arise. A leader must be "tuned in" to the signals that provide insight about the needs and wants of team members, senior management, and suppliers. As a leader, you must know who your customers are, why they come to you and your organization, what they will be looking for in the future, and how your environment is evolving. A leader must be tuned into the competitors (what products they offer and how customers see them).

Yet, society, in general, is addicted to "short term" thinking and many of us are addicted to the daily routine activity trap. Too many people are caught in a short-cycle, stimulus-response mode. We worry about managing our "to do list," what will happen this week, whether we'll make our numbers, getting a product launched on time, or how to get equipment fixed to meet a deadline. We see sales numbers on a certain product decline, and we react quickly with a short-term fix and perspective. We put out the urgent fires and fail to think about the longer-term impact of our behaviors and attitudes. This cycle seduces us into a non-strategic state of mind. We continue to do what we've always done, even when the changing conditions may make those solutions irrelevant to today's problems. We simply overlook opportunities to see decisions, actions and ideas from a strategic perspective. Too often, our goal is only to survive the next crisis. We over manage today at the expense of the future.

There are plenty of legitimate reasons why we pay attention to operational and short-term issues. In many cases, we get rewarded for it and our job security depends upon it. But we must also look to the horizon and identify the signs that indicate coming changes or disruptions in our world. The challenge we face, is that no one will give us the time to consider these issues - we have to make a conscious choice to carve out an opportunity to look to the future. Through strategic leadership we have to shift gears, slow down, and focus our mind with discipline and skill.

When you develop the discipline to set aside some energy and attention from your daily urgencies and look to the horizon, you can create numerous advantages for yourself and your team. For example, you'll be able to anticipate and prepare a planned and orchestrated response when a competitor mounts a huge campaign in your area. You'll identify new technology, methods, or approaches that will increase your effectiveness and reduce costs. You'll experience fewer unpleasant surprises, fewer adverse consequences, and as a result, less stress. You'll also experience fewer calamities because you will have anticipated them long before they materialize.

Strategic leadership requires the ability to see and understand your work environment. It requires objectivity and an ability to separate you from the maelstrom of daily events, and look at the bigger picture.

If you would like to learn more about effective Strategic Leadership and the process, tools, and skill to get out of the "daily routine," please contact one of our Regional Managers at (888)262-2499. If you would like to read more about the topic of Strategic Leadership, please order a copy of our book Ahead of the Curve: A Guide to Applied Strategic Thinking.

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