Why you need a strategic operating system.
Strategy needs a practical operating system as much as blue-sky thinking.
The big ideas are still everything. But in the new world, where all the ways we work are converging—so are the details on how to get it done.
Industries are merging. The physical, digital, what a company creates, how they deliver and what they communicate are all entwined.
Multidimensional thinkers are needed now, more than ever. And multiple teams and workflows are the norm.
So there’s a lot of talk about aligning strategy with execution, which is key. But where I see things fall through the cracks is when companies fail to align their separate business, brand and marketing strategies with each other.
It’s understandable why this happens. It’s hard. And it’s work that typically involves different teams, disciplines, tech and geographies where people have different goals and are focused on specific parts of the puzzle. Not the ecosystem as a whole.
What ends up happening? Processes become inefficient, budgets get blown and creative ideas don’t hit the mark commercially.
To avoid that, it’s useful to think about, map and align on strategic inflection points before kicking off large strategic projects.
These “intersections” happen between stages of work as it transitions from one form to another, and often one team to another. Like business innovation to business design. Brand definition to brand development. And marketing planning to execution.
Consider: Who needs to be involved to make that strategic transition successful? What does “successful” look like? What are the likely risks and how can we plan for those ahead of time?
And because work today isn’t linear, but happening in parallel and in different places, also look at where the interdependencies and gaps will be so you can close them.
The best strategies are a connective thread. A practical “operating system.” They take big ideas and align the multiple assets, people and processes involved in making them happen, so all pieces build on each other.
This helps you get collective returns from your business, brand and marketing—instead of marginal gains from siloed efforts.