The new year is a time for reflecting on what’s really important. If I may get creative and turn that concept on its side a little, since articulating a new definition for “strategic thinking” (addressing things that matter with insight & innovation), I’ve been trying to get down on paper a list of strategic thinking questions whose answers would help shed light on, “What matters?”
What are great questions to best identify what's strategic, i.e., what really matters in a particular business situation? This is a starting list of strategic thinking questions:
- What does our brand stand for?
- What do we most want to accomplish in the organization?
- How would we describe our best, most valuable customers?
- Who don’t we do business with?
- Who do we win the most business from and why?
- Who do we lose the most business to and why?
- What are the biggest cost drivers in the organization?
- What things would be most devastating (or most embarrassing) if our customers knew about them?
- What’s the biggest unknown in our market?
- What are the best opportunities available to us?
Feel free to start using strategic thinking questions from the list above. Feel even freer still to comment on other strategic planning questions you’ve used successfully to identify “what matters.” - Mike Brown
