Introduction

In the past few months, we have been writing a series of articles all of which have been focused on how to achieve success in business circles. We specifically touched on competitive advantage and how to achieve it under the article titled ‘Crafting Business Strategy’. In case you missed it, please find it here.

In this article, we want to go a step further and discuss how businesses that have already attained competitive advantage can sustain it. Read on…

What Is Strategic Thinking and how does it help an organization sustain competitive advantage?

Whereas many organizations will have a strategic plan or even a strategic planning process, it is organizations that adopt strategic thinking as part of their DNA that continuously outperform their peers. Strategic thinking enables us to perceive and process changes in the world around us in a manner that leads us to deduce cause and effect, especially of a medium- or long-term nature in our organizations, and then respond by initiating conversations about appropriate responses for sustained viability.

So, let’s define the term Strategic Thinking. Strategic thinking is an intentional and rational thought process that focuses on the analysis of critical factors and variables that will influence the long-term success of a business, a team, or an individual. Strategic thinking is a mindset of anticipating changes and having plans in place to deal with them. It involves seeing the big picture, planning, and putting thoughts into action. It includes careful and deliberate anticipation of threats and vulnerabilities to guard against and opportunities to pursue. This kind of thinking requires research, analytical thinking, innovation, problem-solving skills, communication and leadership skills, and decisiveness. At the heart of strategic thinking is the ability to anticipate major shifts in the competitive marketplace and identify emerging opportunities. When practiced consistently across time and across the organization, we can attribute to that organization strategic thinking as a key cultural attribute, or more simply put, a ‘culture of strategic thinking’.

Businesses adept with proficient thinking are more alert to the competitive landscape and its vulnerability hence they are better prepared how to counter any emerging changes to avoid losing their place in the market.

Strategic thinkers know that new market trends are always emerging hence they are always on the lookout so that they can understand them, adopt them, and run with them early enough before their competitors. This helps them stay ahead and maintain their position in the market.

Strategic thinking helps business leaders gauge when they should introduce tactics that will help attack their key competitors.

Companies proficient in strategic thinking are continually evaluating their businesses’ strengths and weaknesses versus those of their key competitors to know in what area they need to make improvements which helps them ensure there are no loopholes through which their competitors can take up their place.

With strategic thinking, comes innovation in all business aspects, which helps organizations to constantly improve their product offering and customer service, hence sustaining their competitive advantage.

With time, businesses that have adopted strategic thinking as a culture, become more skilled at anticipating, forecasting, and capitalizing on opportunities which helps them stay ahead of their competition. Business leaders in such an environment are also able to remain alert and easily recognize new shifts in the market that can affect their revenue. And no matter how fine the changes may seem, they are then able to devise ways through which they can counter this.

Such companies also continually invest heavily in human capital which in turn sees their long-term success go up.

What’s more, these companies do not solely depend on their periodic strategic plan. They are flexible and they employ strategic thinking throughout the year which helps them counter any threats from the market in good time while maximizing opportunities promptly.

At Stratex, we understand Strategy and Strategic Thinking well, having worked with different organizations across different industries. Incorporation of strategic thinking helps businesses position themselves for leadership in their sectors and higher returns on investment, by extension.