When I was younger and a little naïve, I thought I could make lots of money and retire in my 40’s fulfilling grand plans like traveling the world and living in a mansion. When in my 20’s, thinking about life in my 40’s was inconceivable. The age of 40 was simply a marker in time but beyond my 20-year mind’s horizon. Now in my 60’s I look back and think, yup! I was indeed naïve. I am grateful that I have made it thus far only by the grace and blessings of God.
When still wet behind my ears and working in Melbourne as a Methods Engineer in the early-1980’s I would read about people making loads of money from buying shares and selling them at inflated prices on the stock exchange. It looked as if everyone was lining up to purchase shares in a market, economists were calling the roaring 80’s.
Yes there was a global recession in the early 1970’s but when Australia won the America’s Cup in 1983, after defeating the ‘mighty Americans’ who held the Cup for 132 years, the Australian economy suddenly began to ‘surf’ the wave of euphoria which ushered in a boom time throughout the 80’s until the early 90’s. Some of us would remember that it all came crashing down when Paul Keating famously referred to the 90’s recession as “the recession that Australia had to have”.
While I may be a little flippant with the historical details, at some point in life we all have grand plans. We may have plans to climb Mount Everest, to sail in a one-person yacht around the world or to hike across the United States from East to West. And while these may be too grand for some and beyond the imaginable, I would say there is nothing wrong in dreaming. I’d add ‘dream more and dream big!’ I believe that if we aim for the stars but hit the moon, we will still be better off from where we would be if we did nothing.
Perhaps some of us have less grandiose plans, but by no means less significant for our lives. Such as graduating from University, owning a house, buying a first car, getting married or finding a dream job or even building a self-sustainable vegetable garden. In all these cases planning for things to happen will require thinking strategically about these goals and objectives. While there is an abundant of academic literature on strategic thinking, in simple terms, strategic thinking is defined as a mental process by an individual in the context of achieving a goal, a set of goals or endeavour.
Even in building a vegie garden you will need to know the orientation of the garden relative to the rising and setting sun. You will need to establish the acidity and alkalinity of the soil because different vegetables required different pH levels. You will also need to know about companion planting and so forth. All these decisions are part of strategic thinking.
What about life’s influencing choices or business-related decisions? Here are three observations from my research on strategic thinking.
(1) Strategic thinking prepares a person for the future. None of us know what tomorrow will bring, however the only thing that is worse than the uncertainty of tomorrow is having no plan and strategy. It is too shallow and wasteful to proclaim, ‘Let us eat and drink for tomorrow we die’. I believe we all have a purpose in life and strategic thinking prepares us to accomplish that purpose.
(2) Strategic thinking reduces the margin of error. Whenever we ‘shoot from the hip’, we increase our margin of error. In other words, if our decisions are not purposeful or deliberate, our ambition and what we are aiming for will not be achieved. As a rookie golfer, I can relate to the following coaching instruction. A golf coach will say, if you are not deliberate, it is like stepping up to a ball and hitting it before lining up the shot. Misaligning a shot by a few degrees can send your ball a hundred metres off target. Strategic thinking lines up our actions with our objectives, just as lining up a shot in golf helps us to put the ball closer to the pin. The better we are aligned with our target, the better the odds that we will be going in the right direction.
(3) Strategic thinking gives a person influence with others. A so-called strategy which at best is foolish and at worst disastrous is reflected in an executive pronouncing that, ‘The company has a short-term plan and a long-term plan. The short-term plan is to stay afloat long enough to make it to the long-term plan’. That is hardly a strategy, yet it is the position some people find themselves in. The person with the plan is the one with the power and influence. Whatever activity we are involved in, strategic thinking is essential to success and achieving one’s goal.
I cannot complete this edition without making a reference to the COVID-19 pandemic which has touched the world. Sometimes life throws us ‘curve balls’ which are unexpected. This pandemic has been one massive ‘curve ball’ Australia and many countries in the world have had to experience and manage. It has thrown many plans, personal, business and even government plans out of the proverbial window. However, it still does not diminish the importance of strategic thinking under such circumstances.
To show that in times like this, strategic thinking is just as important, here are five major attributes of strategic thinking competencies observed by Leanne Liedtka in her book ‘Linking Strategy with Strategic Planning’.
(1) Whole-of-system perspective: Being able to understand implications of strategic actions. In other words, having an end-to-end view of action and impact.
(2) Intentional drive: Having the focus that allows individuals to garner and leverage their energy, to focus attention, to resist distraction, and to concentrate for as long as it takes to achieve a goal.
(3) Thinking in time means being able to keep in mind the past, present, and future at the same time, as this helps in better decision making.
(4) Hypothesis driven: Ensuring that both creative and critical thinking, based on tested outcomes, are incorporated into strategy making.
(5) Intelligent opportunism: Being responsive to good opportunities and having a positive outlook based on research and evaluation.
We all can acquire these attributes of thinking. Often, we need to learn and be aware of these. As for me, I have had to learn through education, good counsel, and experience. It was folly in hindsight to think I could simply buy and sell shares and make ‘millions’ and retire at 40 without strategic thinking.
Yes, I had plans and goals, but it was achieved with hard work, astute decision making and discernment. As strategic thinking is defined, I applied a mental process of defining my set of goals and working at it to achieve the desired outcome.
It must be acknowledged that it was not me alone who achieved the set of goals but a lot of people who backed me, spoke into my life and who walked alongside me. They included my parents, my wife, family, colleagues, and friends. Like Sir Edmund Hillary who conquered Mount Everest, or Robin Knox-Johnston who singlehandedly circumnavigated the world under sail, each one had a team of supporters and encouragers that helped them achieve their goal.
There is not an endeavour or goal in life where strategic thinking is not a prerequisite. As we learn to live in today’s world of lockdowns and restrictions, one thing that cannot be locked down is our preparedness to think strategically.
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