Part of the Business in a Week series
Strategic thinking is the most important management skill of the future. Strategy is about what tomorrow will be like and then working it back today. Strategy is about direction for all organisations and their units, for the largest company and for the smallest school. Most of all, strategy is about being different.
Although strategy is important many of us have difficulty in understanding what it is and how to develop it. Some have made it into an elitist, boardroom affair, some into a matter for statistical wizards. Others are demystifying it for everyone in the organisation to contribute.
'Understanding Strategy in a Week' exposes the past, present and future of strategy, covering:
- How strategy has changed, what it is, and what it isn't
- What leading management thinkers say about strategy
- Case studies of strategies great and small
- How to develop a strategy in tune with today's markets
- The key elements in turning strategy into action
Bob Norton and Ray Irving work in the Institute of Management's Information Centre. They became disenchanted with the old way of formulating strategy, recognising that it didn't really work and thinking it far too important a matter to be left to the few at the top. They also discovered that they were not on their own. A new wave of strategic thinking had emerged to reflect the topsy-turvy business environment of the 1990s.
