We've received several questions about strategic planning. Last month we look at what's real about strategic planning, and what is fanciful thinking about it. This month we look at definitions of strategy.

  There's a new book out on strategy that purports to take the reader through the multifold definitions of strategy that one can find in management texts.

 The book is by Henry Mintzberg, Bruce Ahlstrand, and Joseph Lampel. Their book, released in 1998 is called Strategy Safari: A Guided Tour Through the Wilds of Strategic Management.

 It's an important topic, because many business people frequently talk about being strategic, but our experience at TMI is that most people don't know exactly what that means. 

 Mintzberg and his coauthors conclude that there are five definitions of strategy. A strategy can be:

•  a plan
•  a pattern
•  a position
•  a perspective and
•  a ploy.

 If you want to read everything there is to know about strategy as it has been discussed by management gurus, then Strategy Safari is for you. Our experience at TMI, however, is that most people who are struggling to get through their days making the best decisions possible need a hands-on definition of what it means to be strategic. 

 For those of you who have attended TMI USA's Time Manager course, Strategic Planning for Results, we define being strategic as spending time on high-value, non-urgent tasks. Sometimes, high-value, urgent tasks can be strategic, but mostly they are operational.

 We think there is a nice link between TMI's hands-on definition of being strategic and Mintzberg and his coauthors' five definitions of a strategy. 

 For example, being strategic sometimes involves planning. There is little short-term benefit from planning. It mostly helps us get to and through the future.

 At times being strategic is taking the time to realize the patterns that exist with your clients, your work, your marketing approach, etc.  That is high-value, non-urgent work. I just recently met a long-time Time Manager user who said that he spent too much time with some of his clients who actually generated little business for him. At the same time, he had one client who was extremely helpful, and provided his firm with substantial sums of money to invest. Yet, he only visited this client once a year. I encouraged him to analyze his clients, and then plan on how to allocate his time with them. An operational mind set would keep him responding to all the clients who wanted his time but actually had relatively little money to invest with him.

 Sometimes, being strategic is taking a position, also high-value, but non-urgent work. It's figuring out when and where to take risks, and then how to sell your position. One Time Manager user successfully argued that his corporate offices should let him spend a year at headquarters, rather than sending him out on another mission where he was sure to fail. He thought through his approach, sold it to senior management, and then after a year, went out again into the field and was highly successful. Now he runs an entire region for this company. 

 Being strategic can also involve adopting a particular perspective, again high-value, but non-urgent work. For example, TMI client companies who are attempting to transform their organizations into complaint-friendly companies are strategically attempting to reengineer their entire approach and thinking to customers and about complaints.

 Finally, being strategic can also involve allocating time to tasks that create an impression of some type. Being strategic can mean being sensitive to public relations, both within and outside an organization. Public relations that is thought out, rather than a tool to react to events, is definitely high-value, non-urgent work.

 I'm not certain that Strategy Safari will help you to be more strategic. But you certainly will recognize the book's definitions as related to your high-value, non-urgent work.

Please submit your questions to Time Manager Questions and Answers. If you have questions, undoubtedly someone else has the same question. By asking a question, you'll help a fellow Time Manager user become more effective.

Janelle M. Barlow, President 
TMI, USA 

Previous "Time Manager Q & A Corner" pages: 
 

#1	Key Areas and Interruptions
#2	Daily Plans and Home Offices
#3	Result Statements
#4	Reading and Responding to E-Mail
#5	Sending E-Mail
#6	Filing According to Key Areas
#7	Setting up Files for the Whole Office
#8	Controlling Loose Pieces of Paper
#9	The Value of Time
#10	More on Results Statements
#11	Managing Time on the Road
#12	How to Get Time with Someone
#13	The Downside of Goals
#14	Thinking Types and Time
#15	Feeling Types and Time
#16	Intuitive Types and Time
#17	Sensate Types and Time
#18	What's Real about Strategic Planning?

Please submit your questions to Time Manager Questions and Answers by fax or e-mail . If you have questions, undoubtedly someone else has the same question. By asking a question, you'll help a fellow Time Manager user become more effective.

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