Best Practices for Business Strategy
Strategy in Action: What a Strategy Expert Really Does
There’s a certain mystique around strategy roles. From the outside, it can seem like a strategist just gives high-level advice, draws elegant diagrams, or speaks in frameworks. But anyone who’s actually done the job knows it’s more grounded — and more demanding — than it looks.
Strategy is not about knowing everything. It’s about making sure the organization is asking the right questions, seeing the real constraints, and making decisions with purpose — not just momentum.
Here’s what that work actually looks like on a practical level.
1. Defining the real problem — not just responding to noise
A big part of strategy is cutting through the surface-level requests (“we need to grow faster”, “we should launch in this market”) and asking: what’s actually at stake here?
Sometimes, a team says they need more resources, but the real issue is misaligned incentives. Or leadership is pushing a product line that doesn’t fit the company’s position anymore. The strategist’s job is to frame the problem clearly, so energy isn’t wasted on the wrong questions.
Example: Instead of debating whether to cut prices, the strategist reframes the conversation: “Do we have a clear idea of what segment we’re winning in — and why?”
2. Making assumptions visible
Most companies operate on unspoken assumptions: “Our customers value speed more than price,” or “We can scale this model without hiring more support staff.” The strategist writes those down and tests them — not with theory, but with reality.
This might look like:
Designing a simple experiment to test user behavior.
Modeling what happens if a cost increases 20%.
Asking: “What needs to be true for this plan to work?”
The goal is to make sure decisions are based on shared, explicit logic — not wishful thinking.
3. Connecting teams that don’t speak the same language
Strategy work often means standing at the intersection of departments that rarely align: product, sales, finance, ops. Everyone’s solving their own version of the problem. But their decisions affect each other.
The strategist listens, translates, and surfaces the conflicts early — before they become blockers. This isn’t about “consensus.” It’s about clarity.
Example: Product wants to build a feature that makes onboarding smoother, but ops knows support tickets are rising. The strategist links the two by showing how both problems are symptoms of deeper user confusion.
4. Mapping constraints — especially the ones no one wants to talk about
Every strategy sounds good until you look at the bottlenecks. A good strategist identifies them early.
This could mean:
Noticing that a team depends on one senior hire to execute three projects.
Flagging that launching in a new market would stretch legal resources too thin.
Spotting that a growth forecast assumes perfect retention, which hasn’t happened in two years.
Strategy isn’t just vision. It’s working within limits — and knowing which ones you can actually move.
5. Thinking in scenarios, not certainties
Strategic planning isn’t about predicting the future. It’s about preparing for different versions of it.
A strategy expert builds simple, clear scenarios:
“If acquisition costs rise 15%…”
“If the new product is delayed…”
“If our main competitor copies this feature…”
The point isn’t to cover every possibility — it’s to help the company make better decisions today, knowing that things may shift tomorrow.
6. Turning ideas into real steps
One of the most useful things a strategist does is help others move from big goals to actionable sequences.
For example, instead of “We want to expand into Latin America,” it becomes:
Validate demand in three specific countries.
Identify local partners.
Build a minimum viable ops model with existing resources.
Strategy work often ends with a Google Doc full of bullets — not a glossy slide deck.
7. Revisiting and adjusting — constantly
A strategy that isn’t updated is just a bet on inertia. Good strategists keep track of the original plan, compare it to what’s actually happening, and aren’t afraid to change course when needed.
This means revisiting decisions monthly or quarterly and asking:
Is the logic still sound?
What’s gone better or worse than expected?
What new constraints have emerged?
Being “strategic” is not about being right the first time. It’s about staying aligned as things change.
Final Thought
Strategy isn’t glamorous. Most of it happens in quiet conversations, spreadsheets, internal docs, and a lot of thinking between meetings. But done right, it changes how an organization sees itself — and how it moves.
The best strategists don’t just ask where the company is going. They make sure it knows why, what could get in the way, and how to get there with eyes open.
