Act on small things. Small things become big, so they’re as important as the largest. Keep watch, anticipate difficulties. Act early to keep order without much effort. A small challenge now avoids large challenges later.
Problem definition can prevent strategic misadventure. Strategic misadventure is something that doesn’t need to happen. It’s effort, time and treasure expended doing something that’s not just peripheral, but a distraction. And distractions can have huge opportunity cost. Problem definition is a human process. This is why we often get it wrong and strategic misadventures result.…
True leaders are the last to take credit. The best leaders attribute success to the performance of the team and its key players. It shows up in language. When celebrating success they say “you did” or “we did”. It’s never “I did…” except when taking responsibility for failure. Don’t try to own the outcomes or…
The most valuable and most scarce resource in any organisation is executive bandwidth. Opportunity cost is a challenge for everyone. But the challenge for executives – those in leadership roles – is amplified by the consequences of different choices. That depends on the size and nature of the organisation. In the commercial world it’s about…
This article explains a concept in the Strategy Canvas to help achieve success – Key Insights and Theory of Victory. It covers exploration of key insights to develop a theory of victory as a strategic narrative, with a broad-brush view of a historical example.