What is Strategy?

Strategy is a word that's used so much without a real agreement on its definition. We want to think more strategically, but we don't really know what that means. Does it mean long term thinking? Does it mean working on the business instead of in the business?

I like Michael Porter's definition of strategy: deliberately choosing a different set of activities to deliver a unique mix of value. Notice his focus. Porter doesn't focus strategy on striving to be better than the competition on all attributes. His focus is on choosing a different set of activities to deliver a unique mix of value.

I love Sally Hogshead's quote, "Different is better than better." What are your differentiators? We need to strive to be the best in the world at a small set of activities and be willing to be mediocre, or even bad, everywhere else. Have you identified the attributes that really matter in your marketplace? Once you do, here's a key problem I see in companies trying to identify where they are or where they can be different. They tend to overstate what they do well and understate what the competition does well. How well do you understand both the strong and weak attributes of your competition? How accurately are you assessing your own attributes?

Working more strategically means finding and executing on your differentiators - the white space in your market. How often are you honestly assessing your market? What are you doing to find your white space?