Why strategic thinking skills are important
By: Lindsay Angelo, Futurist, Growth Strategist, Keynote Speaker
Strategic thinking for organizations, teams, and individuals is more important than ever. With the age of big data has come a growing need to work through complex problems and opportunities effectively and with agility. Yet only 30% of business leaders are strategic thinkers, partly because strategic thinking isn’t taught in schools or in organizations – it’s a learned skill that you may or may not be lucky enough to acquire. Through this deep dive into strategic thinking, you will learn the importance of why strategic thinking skills are important and how you can utilize them.
As a fundamental business and management skill, being a strategic leader is critical to your ability to maneuver your work effectively, advance your career, make hand on business decisions, create strong business insights, and grow a brand, company, or organization effectively.
So, how do you know if you're struggling with strategic thinking?
For individual contributors, the biggest “tells” are…
You have too much on the go and priorities are not clear
You’re overwhelmed by options, data, and insights and don’t know where to start
You’re in unproductive meetings or irrelevant discussions with no forward momentum in the work
At the company level, pain points include:
You're facing a surplus of strategic decisions and are feeling paralyzed in data
The status quo culture has become burnout - teams are working day and night and operational planning has turned into your worst nightmare
Strategic planning isn't in your vocabulary - heck, you can barely craft an action plan for your team offsite let alone a strategic plan!
Whether at the individual level or team level, I think it’s fair to say that we’ve all been there at some point in our professional learning journey.
So, before we proceed...what is strategic thinking?
There are a lot of different schools of thought on how to define strategic thinking. Many of them relate to military analogies, game theory, business goals, battleships, and winning and losing. The simple answer is strategic thinking is having the ability to evaluate a business challenge, consider broader business objectives, make good choices, and understand the potential impact of those decisions.
The short answer? A superpower.
When to use strategic thinking?
A key benefit of strategic thinking as a tool is its versatility…meaning you can use it to answer a host of questions that arise in both work and life.
Everything from…
How do you lift traffic to your online channel?
How do you build brand awareness in the market or increase market share?
How do you allocate resources effectively?
Where should you be spending your time?
What's our corporate strategy? What's our marketing strategy? Operations strategy? Brand strategy? You get my drift...
To…
What kind of car should I buy?
What color should I paint the house?
Where should we go on our next vacation?
The sweet spot of strategic thinking? When you’re trying to solve a complex problem with a tight timeline. This is why building your strategic thinking muscle now is more of an advantage than ever. Think about the following:
a) problems are becoming increasingly complex due to the pace of change in the world, digital connectivity and the volume of data available - market data, customer data, competitive data, employee data, the list goes on
b) as competition increases across many industries and customer expectations grow, so does the importance of working through problems/opportunities quickly and with agility
For both of these reasons, I’d argue that strategic thinking isn’t optional anymore – it’s a critical skill. In other words, if you're not doing it, you’re leaving time, energy, and/or dollars on the table.
So, how do you improve your strategic thinking skills?
Here are seven simple tactics to improve your strategic thinking skills and maximize your chance of success. Transform these into key strengths - and you'll be halfway there!
Take an ecosystem view: scan your external environment regularly. A great strategic thinker is able to understand the relationship between a wide range of disparate data, and the complexion of the business environment and identify opportunities and/or threats. Systematic thinking and big picture thinking while also having the ability to zoom in is key.
Build your analytical skills - a great strategic thinker needs the ability to analyze a variety of inputs, maneuver data swiftly, and take a logical approach to problem-solving while also flexing their creative thinking. Financial statements, KPIs, market conditions, emerging business trends, business knowledge, and internal resource allocation - all of these are rich data sources that require analytical thinking in order to identify practical insights that translate into business opportunities.
Develop your business innovation skills. Innovation and strategy are like peanut butter and jam. Great strategy takes great innovation and great innovation normally takes great strategy. Familiarize yourself with the language of innovation - terms like disruptive innovation, incremental innovation, transformational innovation, business model innovation, blue oceans, market shifts, etc. Check out Harvard Business Review for rich innovation resources.
Think a few steps ahead, in work and in life. Try and second anticipate your competitor's next move - or your partner's for that matter. Great strategic thinking takes foresight and vision - it takes brainstorming future scenarios, opportunities, and challenges - and crafting long-term strategies that account for both. Practice this in your current role first. Pretty soon you'll be building bullet-proof business strategies.
Keep an open mind. One of the biggest challenges to adopting a strategic mindset is tunnel vision. Practice an open-minded approach, including not getting too attached to your ideas and opinions. An openness to strategic alternatives is a must. A great solution doesn't care who arrived at it! Accounting for creative solutions and alternative solutions and strategic ideas throughout the process is a must.
Master your critical thinking skills and problem-solving skills. These two elements form the core of a great strategic thinking mind. Critical thinking skills allow you to maneuver strategic challenges and strategic goals efficiently. Effective leaders and strategic leaders are often great critical thinkers.
Build your listening skills - a great strategic thinker always has their ears open. Powerful listening skills and the ability to ask the right questions are key to establishing a strategic thinking mindset and strategic approach.
Strategic thinking capabilities can be built through training, practice, and the courage of repetition.
If you can translate each skill above into a strength, you'll be on your way to maximizing your strategic contribution and realizing your potential as a business leader.
Looking for an even deeper understanding? Enroll in my Strategic Thinking Training for business leaders and organizations.
Stay tuned for my next post on effective strategy and the strategic thinking process!
FAQs
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Yes, this course is all delivered online virtually and is built for flexibility and with an interactive format. If you're a brand or an organization, a blended learning format is also available. Our strategic thinking training program has also been featured on major media such as Business Insider and the Associated Press.
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It’s training that teaches you to think more strategically about your work, business - and life. In the context of business, it teaches you how to make powerful and effective strategic decisions in the context of your business strategy.
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No, strategic thinking is different from design thinking and design thinking methods. They are complementary to each other and are both practical tools.
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The fully online course takes roughly three hours to complete. We recommend a set of "sprints" - i.e. one hour per week for three weeks. That said, we designed the course to be self-led so you can go at whatever pace feels most comfortable.
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Yes, the data points to strategic thinking being the top skill correlated with becoming an effective leader. Not only will having a strategic thinking mindset help in work, but in life - it's a versatile skill that can be applied in many scenarios and to many a strategic opportunity!
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The course is multimedia, combining a mix of video modules, practical thinking exercises, knowledge checks, and text. We designed it to be self-led for you to experience anywhere in the world at your own pace. Check out more here.
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You'll learn a broad set of techniques from strategic problem-solving skills (aka. hypothesis-driven thinking) and critical thinking skills to creative thinking, shadow-boxing, systematic thinking, business strategy, and foresight skills through practical thinking exercises. Amongst the big data age and in a quickly changing landscape, strategy skills and adopting a strategic mindset have never been more fundamental skills in business.
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The course covers how to translate strategy and strategic direction into a road map of programs, projects, and action plans. It covers how to allocate resources and where strategic planning skills intersect with financial budgeting, which is key to business success. It does not cover detailed project management.
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There are many business courses and certificate programs that cover strategy theory - even some programs that cover conventional thinking and strategic thinking process. This course is the only of its kind that's applied and delivered by a real-world strategist with decades of experience building strategy for fortune 500 brands through to start-ups. Consider it a practical Mini-MBA program!
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You can improve your decision-making process and strategic thinking skills by enrolling today. The course specifically teaches hypothesis-driven thinking, one of the most powerful methods for making prompt decisions. Smarter decisions are a step away from your leadership development.
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Generally speaking, the course covers how to think into the future taking into account insights. It includes basic concepts and critical concepts along with more complex business concepts and complex ideas. However, it doesn't get into step-by-step scenario planning. Learn more about our Futurist-in-50-Days training program here which covers scenario planning in detail.
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Diving into the world of business modeling is out of scope for this course. Please see Lindsay's TEDx talk for more on this or contact Lindsay.
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Yes, it will help you make an informed decision on where to invest, to an extent. The course covers how to think about trade-offs between strategic options, organizational decision-making, and how to translate business strategy into execution and financial performance. If you're a brand or organization it will help you build a strategic thinking capability. It doesn't cover market sizing, budgeting, business modeling, or financial planning.
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This course is for business leaders, senior leadership teams, senior management, and industry leaders working in strategic roles and wanting to make a big impact and build their corporate leadership through strategic thinking capabilities - from CEOs and founders to executive-level leaders like Senior Executives, Business Executives, Corporate Leaders, Senior Vice Presidents, Senior Leaders, Senior Managers, Managers, and individual contributors. We reach a wide array of industries - retail, consumer products, technology, saas, health and wellness, finance...come one come all! We tailor to individuals and organizations. Have a business unit, business function, or team? We tailor to you too!
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Yes, strategic thinking is a critical thinking skill under the umbrella of business acumen - it enables informed decisions and smarter decisions in the context of your business strategy and the future direction of your business.
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There aren't any program dates - on some other programs, it is self-directed so you can enroll anytime you'd like.
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Absolutely - strategic thinking is one of the top most correlated skills with successful leadership.
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Check out Harvard Business Review, Harvard Business School Online. Harvard Business School Online has a host of resources as your disposal. Click here to access Harvard Business School Online.
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Yes, Lindsay facilitates strategic planning sessions, strategic planning workshops and strategic thinking sessions alongside the core training. They are a great complement to the training! Contact us here to learn more.
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Yes, it will help assess market conditions, conduct market analysis, identify market trends and craft go to market plans.
About the Author
Lindsay provides growth and advisory services to purpose-driven brands. Named a global innovation leader and Women to Watch, you will find her at the intersection of strategy, story-telling and innovation. When she’s not collaborating with clients, she’s hitting TEDx and other stages across North America to deliver keynotes on the future of consumerism, strategy and innovation. Prior to advising and providing brand and marketing consulting services, Lindsay spent six years at lululemon crafting their global growth strategy, exploring new marketplace opportunities and growing the company into the number one yoga wear player in the world. Her experiences culminate in what she refers to as her sweet spot - where strategy, innovation and insights intersect, where the rational meets the emotive and logic meets intuition.
