How can you improve a leader's strategic thinking and decision making?

Leadership requires strategic thinking and decision-making. Here's how to improve: Embrace Learning: 1. Lifelong Learning: Read, attend workshops, mentorship. 2. Learn from Failure. 3. Embrace Diverse Ideas. Strategic Training: 1. Scenario Planning. 2. SWOT Analysis. 3. Foster Critical Thinking. Encourage Collaboration: 1. Diverse Teams. 2. Constructive Debate. 3. Leverage External Networks. Data-Driven Decisions: 1. Data Literacy. 2. Promote a Data-Driven Culture. 3. Provide Data Analysis Tools. Reflect and Plan: 1. Strategic Retreats. 2. Periodic Review. 3. Align Goals with Values. Enhancing leadership skills leads to better performance, innovation, and growth. It's about shaping a brighter future.

Mentoring is decisive in helping to improve strategic thinking and improve decision-making by a leader. Although it is true that techniques have advanced a lot in our times, the experience of mentors becomes vital to develop strategic thinking that improves the decision-making process.

Strategy development is not the sole responsibility of the CEO or even the executive team. Its important that CEO lead along with the executive. The best strategies are developed by using a cross-section of line management and employees from across the organization. This does several things. 1. It gets ideas from the field level where local information is key to strategy. 2. It involves the organization so you get buy-in when it comes to execution of the strategy. 3. Strategy is about execution as well as determining talent requirements. 4. Involving geographic input is important to get international nuances in the strategy.

SWOT is relatively useless. It is too simplistic and the big question is, where do the Os come from? Typically leaders follow the trending initiatives of others and this is anything but strategic. Strategy requires doing something unique and this requires creativity, followed by business modeling, and financial/risk assessment.

The first step is to assess leader's personality type. Most leader types have a bias for executional. Their interpretation of what strategy adapts to their type. They need to understand that strategy requires creating something new, meaning taking moderate risk. Most leaders tend to seek certainty. That means newly created opportunities killed. Leaders need to learn that assessing an idea requires business and financial models, and other decision making factors like benefits/harm to society.

Spending time upfront on strategy education with a cross-section of management is important. Defining what strategy means, what are the inputs and outputs. So that everyone understands on what strategy development is all about. Execution goes hand-in hand with strategy development. HR requirements, finance needs are also key so that the plan gets done in a manageable way.

This is the most important step, and if a team does nothing else, it can get by just by having a shared goal. Here again we could jump into quadrants, yet this overcomplicates and obscures what needs to be a razor sharp, instantly comprehensible concept. Kevin Starr and the Mulago Foundation have an excellent "Designing for Impact" framework that starts with an 8 word mission statement. This is an excellent innovation for any organization that wants to very simply and powerfully define its mission without getting lost in the weeds.

This is wrong! Smart objectives should only be set after a strategic initiative turns into a project. Smart objectives demand that people take an approach that is certain, but strategy involves taking moderate risks.

Decision trees are great in this context, to visualize the potential outcomes of different decisions. Aided by decision-making based on core values including ethics.

My opinion, we need more listening and less greed! We can’t have leadership boards without “normal” people in positions of power.

It can be easy to overdo it here, and the 'Rule of Threes' can help simplify choices. No matter how many options there might be (typically infinite!), choose three final... anythings... to represent the total landscape. These could be three scenarios, three potential vendors, three goals, three gameplans... etc. For example, let's say we wanted to look at a choice of political platforms to see which would be most successful in a given market - presenting one Right, one Center and one Left instantly structures the conversation and simplifies choices.

Most clients view creativity as risky. They confuse managerial and strategic risk. Their mindset is directly related to their personality type. ISTJs view strategy as doing what is internally within their control. Strategy might be operational excellence or adopting some proven process (e.g. Lean). ESTJs rely on adopting the "proven" initiatives of others. ENTJs want to adopt the latest technology whether it is truly strategic or not. I developed a method for creating truly strategic visions that can be used by any personality type.

There are almost always options or alternatives with significant business decisions. For example, you might be asked for a concession in a negotiation. Before you land on an answer take it a step further and consider "what if" we agree or disagree. Meaning what is likely to happen next. By saying no will the negotiation fall apart and end? If so, can we live with that. By saying yes, will another concession request follow it? You'll often find that a few of these "what if" scenarios will often lead you to consistently thinking ahead and anticipating what will follow and thereby positioning yourself for a more beneficial outcome.

The real pitfall in this step is 'analysis paralysis,' and it doesn't have to be more complicated than asking, "How well does this accomplish our goal?" If your plan does accomplish the goal, then why spend time looking at alternatives?

It is critical to establish the NPV of the opportunity, at 75% probability of success. The NPV must be positive using the hurdle rate of the business. This ensures that a moderate degree of risk is being taken. Reasonable assumptions need to be made in the financial model.

One thing I have found helpful around the various process tools and KPI setting. Is having a team of experienced and diverse members, who have all the touch points within the organisation. This also helps immensely in the change management process, which is key in any programme.

Here is where you establish smart objectives. Use a project model to implement the initiative. Appoint a project manager and team.

Delegation is key - executives will often want details from colleagues without realizing that even relatively minor (from their perspective) information requests create extra work and may cannibalize more important tasks. Finding the lightest possible management structure can liberate team members to focus on their best work. This could be as little as a quarterly check in to review a (short!) list of key metrics against previously stated goals.

Here is where you establish smart objectives. Use a project model to implement the initiative. Appoint a project manager and team.

Thinking of these as separate steps is somewhat misleading. As management teams are reviewing results, they are naturally already defining the next round of goals, since this is a continuous learning and implementation cycle rather than a series of independent steps. A broad catchall term is, 'Design Thinking,' and this process can be very helpful, assuming that team members all agree to fully participate.

Strategy is about increasing revenue and cash flow by fulfilling customers' needs better than competitors. It is critical to understand if new customers are being attracted and if existing customers are returning and spending more money.

Consider utilising a strategy framework that can cover all these aspects - setting goals - refining your value proposition - assessing the environment - reviewing resources (people, money, sales and product) and identifying risks - that then allows you plan for the future. Take a look at @GrowthSprint.

In this question, what’s the end goal? To me, it sounds like making high quality decisions. This question seems to assume that strategic thinking and high-quality decision making go hand-in-hand, and that is not always (not even often) the case. if you have a client who struggles with strategic thinking, the best possible solution is for them to to surround themselves with strategic thinker’s (Coach included). That is an intelligent decision in and of itself. If they want to improve their decision making, have better options to make. If you have a tough decision to make, and all four options are fantastic, then you can’t go wrong. Don’t overcomplicate a goal, clarify it, dig deep, figure out what the core is and then go to work.

If your Internal Coaching efforts are not inspiring your teams, or if your Coaches themselves would benefit from some additional development, experienced External Coaches can offer an invaluable outsider perspective. Five reasons to choose an external coach are; 1. To help the coachee to gain independent views and gain insight. 2. To hold people accountable to deliver on their actions. 3. To create discipline that lasts. 4. To experience a much faster learning curve. 5. To drive faster results.

This is quite a similar approach to that designed by Curly Martin (great coach, great author, great books !). She trains people in non directive coaching to use the I CAN DO model - Investigate, Current, Aims, Number of options, Dates and Outcomes. It works really well … I like to add either a reward or transformation at the end …. But that kind of ruins the model ( I CAN DOR or I CAN DOT don’t have the same elegance as Curly’s model).

The essence of good strategic thinking is to simplify complexity down to a number of clear and distinct options, then to evaluate those options in a rational and structured way to identify the best path ahead. The MECE model by McKinsey (Mutually Exclusive, Collectively Exhaustive) is an effective way of knowing that the options you are evaluating are distinct from one another but also not missing anything significant. An example of MECE is "our options for growth are A: in our home country, or B: abroad." Two distinct options that together cover all possibilities. Good strategic thinking should cut through the fog. Even when you don't have all the answers, you can still make logical decisions based on the available information.