Strategic Thinking ≠ Long-Term Thinking
Today’s decisions and actions are more important
Today’s decisions and actions are more important
On October 24, 2010, Steve Jobs e-mailed the agenda of the secret strategy meeting of a top 100 executives. It lists the questions that Jobs and other Apple executives had to present to the staff. A screenshot of this letter is available online.
Jobs was supposed to speak first. His part of the report was called «Strategy 2011». Note — not 2021 nor 2041. Strategy for the year ahead? There were six points in his report:
– Who are we?
– What do we do?
– Post PC Era
– 2011: Holy War with Google
– 2011: Year of the Cloud
– 2015: New Campus
Two points out of six — Post PC Era and Year of the Cloud — look as prophecies from today. Were they brilliant examples of future thinking?
Yes and no.
Jobs’ strategic gift was not about an ability to see the future world. I have never read his forecasts about the future, and maybe, there were no ones. But what he was very good at was his ability to see small changes today that can grow into massive paradigm shifts tomorrow.
I don’t know how exactly he thought. But I guess that his thoughts followed this pattern:
I see the changes that happen around me. For instance — the rise of internet connection speed.
Do these changes make the world better? Do they bring more convenience and comfort to consumers or users?
If they do, how can I use them to reinforce my company’s market position?
It is only my game of imagination. Maybe his course of thought was different from what I imagined. But from my experience of working with successful entrepreneurs, I may say they think similarly. They don’t envisage the future; they see the slight alterations and think about using them to leverage their companies’ strengths.