We make an important distinction in our practice between traditional strategic planning and strategic positioning.

Strategic planning is a linear process, typically with a lot of known variables or assumptions in place. It is the stuff of marketing and corporate policy textbooks from an age of a less-intense competitive environment: goals, objectives, actions, timelines, and performance measurements.

Strategic positioning, in our view, is about creating and maintaining a competitive advantage in a hyper-competitive environment that is constantly changing. It is a non-linear approach which aligns core competencies and inner strengths with enduring market opportunities to create truly sustainable competitive advantage.

When technological advances and global competition can change your competitive position overnight, you need to center your organization around core competencies that don’t change easily. When markets are a moving target, you need to look below the surface at what are the enduring characteristics and needs of your customers and be unflinching in satisfying those while extremely flexible in how you do so. Strategically positioning your organization to compete is what we are here to do.