The following questions were raised on the Next Director blog: Is strategic thinking a mindset or a process? Is it innate or learned? How can individuals develop this expertise? What distinguishes top strategic thinkers from other executives? How should organisations accomplish this? What do individual executives need to do?



A lot depends on how one defines one's terms. One definition of "Strategy" is "a long term plan for success". Therefore "Strategic" thinking is the ability to think in terms of plans for success. Contemporary usage of the terms however imply a "high-level", "more important" view, or an approach that makes fundamental changes to some core assumptions. It's not a matter of what is "right or wrong" here, but what is meant by the question as that informs the response.


If one asks whether is it possible for managers to "think about success", or be taught "how to think about success", then this is possible as evidenced by every business school that teaches strategy. Part of the challenge then is to define "success", as this is not universally agreed.

Is "Success" that which management defines or subjectively determines as "success"; or is it some independent measure that management strives to achieve, such a shareholder objectives as interpreted by the Board?

If one's intent in asking the initial questions is to determine whether people can be taught techniques for thinking out of the box or laterally, then the qualified answer is yes, they can be taught techniques, but their comfort and spontaneity with the process relies on their right or left brain tendencies. A person with a preference and comfort with right-brain (creative) thinking is more likely to have thoughts or ideas that challenge conventional assumptions than someone who is predominantly left-brain. Each can be taught techniques that enable them to cope with their "non-preferred" hemisphere, but they are unlikly to have total comfort there. Having said that, the most powerful and successful leaders appear to have comfort in both hemispheres.

Furthermore an organisation that has promoted all its senior managers from the "shop-floor", say, from a large manufacturing operation, is likely to have most of those managers exhibiting left-brain tendencies (i.e. eye for detail, predictability, etc). The problem occurs when they are asked to start thinking creatively as part of their management responsibilities, which they may find either hard to do or find to be stress-inducing.

In response to the specific questions:

1. Is strategic thinking a mindset or a process? The act of establishing a "path" to a corporation's objectives is a process. The act of creatively developing a successful outcome may require a right-brain approach, thus may be "mindset" dependent subject to the context and the nature of the objective.

2. Is it innate or learned? Right and left-brain tendencies are innate.

3. How can individuals develop this expertise? Processes can be taught (and are taught in most business programs. Innate tendencies can be complemented by teaching an understanding of those innate tendencies and their impacts, and the way to offset stress or discomfort in one's self.

4. What distinguishes top strategic thinkers from other executives? My experience indicates that firstly, "top performers" within an organisation have the ability and comfort of working effectively in the right-brain (creative) space while understanding the left-brain (implementation) implications of those creative concepts. Secondly, they recognise the right-brainedness or left-brainedness of people and the organisation and sculpt their communications to suit those hemispheral preferences.

5. How should organisations accomplish this? Develop an understanding of its right/left brain character of the organisation and its people. In particular, understand when stress and discomfort is induced when people are asked to perform outside their "preference zone" for a significant period of time.

6. What do individual executives need to do? Reflect on their own hemispheral preferences and understand the preference of their superiors and subordinates. Contemplate the degree that sculpting communications and expectations to suit the target will have in achieving their objectives.