Your Strategy Will Fail. And This Is Good News
We need to re-evaluate the criteria for success
– Nothing personal, Svyatoslav, – said my boss, frowning, – But we have to admit that the strategy you proposed a year ago doesn't work the way you supposed. And this is your fault.
It was 2010. I was the CEO of a large company. The founder and the only shareholder invited me to lead the business 18 months earlier because, as he said, he wanted to "step away from operational management." So I spent the first six months studying the company and the market, and then we, me and my team, proposed a strategy.
I need to mention that:
For the team, it was the first experience devising a strategy;
Our strategy was innovative, so we were planning to disrupt our business model.
Some of our strategic assumptions came true, and some did not. I was content with the results, but my strict boss wasn't. He graciously didn't fire me that time, but I left the company before long. Unfortunately, our visions of strategy and success diverged.
The future
Every day we build many plans, a…