Strategy is about making choices, trade-offs; it’s about deliberately choosing to be different.

Michael Porter

In a highly competitive world with scarce resources, some people think it is harder to excel in life, career and business. Yet there are others who find a way to make their mark.

Why? How?

I believe it is all about strategy. In the short quote above, Harvard professor Michael Porter, often hailed as the Father of Business Strategic Planning highlights succinctly three things that strategy will help you make the difference:

1. It helps you to make a choice. we all face an avalanche of information, options and priorities. Strategy helps you to decide. If you don’t have a strategy, you will be swayed like a boat blown by winds coming from different directions. You will lose focus.

2. Strategy differentiates you from the rest. Coco Chanel says

In order to be irreplaceable, one must be different.

How are you different from your business competitors? How are you different from your rivals? What makes you special? What is your unique selling point as a business, a professional and individual?

In other words, how irreplaceable are you? A good strategy will make you always relevant to your context. I have seen too many people who became irrelevant to the market, to employers, to clients, to spouses, to families and friends. They lost what they fought hardest to keep because they did not have a good clear strategy.

3. Clarity and Focus

Michael Porter talks about deliberateness; strategy is about being clear and focused, so you know what to deliberately do. Good strategy leaves nothing to chance. It does not allow circumstances to dictate your choices. Good strategy helps you see clearly what you need to do and what you must say NO to. Knowing what and when to say YES or NO to is a critical skill for the 21st century.

I hope, through this blog, you get regular input that will clarify clarify clarify your strategy for business, career and life, so that you will live and prosper not by chance, but deliberately.

Enjoy!