Generating strategy ideas

Generating strategy ideas can be easy. The content on this page will help you develop strategies to win in your market and grow your business.

When You Want To Start Generating Strategy Ideas, Keeping It Simple Makes It Easy

Have you ever been part of a strategy meeting that seemed to go around in circles? If you have, you’re not alone. And that’s why keeping strategy simple is smart.

You can find templates online that will help you with generating strategy ideas. Many start with Vision and Mission statements. After that, they use those to work through a process of strategy planning that might become tedious, time-consuming, and hard to execute.

Michael Porter”s Competitive Strategy 

Michael Porter’s book “Competitive Strategy” (Affiliate Link)is a meaty, challenging read. And it’s worth the effort.

What Porter’s book did for me was teach me how to think about strategy. The Five Forces model he teaches, I use as a filter when I am working on my business. 

That is to say, evaluating a potential strategy with a five forces analysis helps me know that I am doing the right things right.

There’s No Wrong Way to Begin Generating Strategy Ideas

Huh? No wrong way? Seriously, it’s true.

I think that if you begin working on, and thinking about, strategy in your business. There’s nothing bad that comes out of doing that.

Sure, you might come up with some objectives that seem far fetched or wrong-headed. And the point is, the beauty is in the exercise and beginning. 

Iteration is the Key To Strategy You Will Use

If you’re like me, you’ve been part of strategy planning sessions where everyone leaves fired up. Only to “get back to the real world” and find that nothing changes, the plans get left in the file, and you get mired in the day-to-day details of your work.

That’s why generating strategy ideas must be iterative. When you create a simple plan, review it often, and make real-time adjustments you’ll find strategy a lot of fun!

After all, you do the work on strategy for your business to help create growth, right? If that’s true, then you’ll find that a monthly update to your plan will help you reach your objectives.

Five Questions for Generating Strategy Ideas

Here are five questions to help you build a strategy from Roger Martin in the Harvard Business Review Site:

1. What are our broad aspirations for our organization & the concrete goals against which we can measure our progress?
2. Across the potential field available to us, where will we choose to play and not play? 
3. In our chosen place to play, how will we choose to win against the competitors there?
4. What capabilities are necessary to build and maintain to win in our chosen manner?
5. What management systems are necessary to operate to build and maintain the key capabilities?

In conclusion

Strategy is a fascinating and complex subject. That’s why I love to write about it and discuss it. You’ll find content on makemarketingeasy.com to help you create plans and stimulate your thinking.

If you’d like a free pdf that I put together about how to make your customers and prospects feel special, fill out the form below. Or, if you’d like to schedule a time to discuss something you’re working on, email me at Joel@makemarketingeasy.com.

Good luck and good marketing and selling!