No bullsh*t strategy
What does your strategy look like?
This week’s essential read was No Bullshit Strategy by Alex H M Smith. I met Alex last month and immediately warmed to his frank assessment of business.
It’s a short read and gets to the point quickly (as you’d expect from such a title).
My biggest takeaways:
Ditch the slide deck. Write your strategy on one piece of paper. In simple language.
Writing in prose will allow people to internalise the strategy and repeat it in their own words. Everyone should understand your strategy—without further explanation.
Only strategies which your competitors might choose not to do are legitimate. Strategies which everyone would agree with, and which everyone would be keen to pursue, are illegitimate.
Great strategies produce companies which have no direct competition at all.
I’m now rewriting our own strategy—as a minimum viable strategy.