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Developing Leadership and Strategic Thinking Skills

Do you wish to improve your leadership and strategic thinking skills? If so try out some of the following development ideas listed below. The list is not meant to be exhaustive but if put into practise they will enable you to improve your strategic thinking and leadership capability.

 Read the business pages of a quality newspaper such as The Times, Financial Times, and Telegraph etc. Alternatively subscribe to the Harvard Business Review. Learn about strategies and actions that other organisations have taken to improve their performance. Determine which ones of these would work well within your organisation.
 Prepare a ‘strategic perspective’ for your business/function. Research what the likely key trends and changes will be in the next 3-5 years? For example changes in technology, applications, competition, legislation, demographics, etc. What opportunities and threats does this provide?
 Research your major competitors and develop a detailed profile of each competitor. What can you learn from them?
 Analyse your customer’s needs. What is it they need and want in your products applications and services now and in the future?
 Challenge the assumptions and beliefs that you have about your business – which ones are obsolete or restrictive? Which ones should you change? For example the internet has challenged the belief that you can only purchase music on a CD/Tape. The digital watch challenged the belief that all watches had to have hands to tell the time.
 Volunteer to work on a cross functional business/organisation improvement project.
 Learn to play chess.
 Discuss with a trusted colleague or manager your ability to strategize and see the ‘big picture’. Identify weaknesses or blind spots. Discus ideas to force yourself to move from details to the ‘big picture’ to gain a broader prospective.
 Seek someone who could act as a mentor (either internally or externally) and could guide you through a strategic planning process.
 Discuss with your manager your ability to make sound judgements and business decisions. What feedback can they give you about your effectiveness? What decisions could you have made differently?
 Identify the most important decision that you have to make in the next 3-6 months. Discuss with your manager or colleague the key steps to making the decision and likely information you will need. Start gathering the relevant information

Alternatively, if the above ideas don’t give you what you need try taking a course or formal qualification such as an MBA to help you to:

 Formulate and execute strategic plans
 Detect the opportunities, threats, strengths and weaknesses that drive a strategic plan
 Identify strategies to better position your organisation for long-term competitive advantage