The concept of strategy is being one of the big ones affected by the great changes that are taking place in consumer behavior, the appearance of the concept of globalization, the constant irruption of new technologies, the Internet "phenomenon", etc.
The «traditional» concept of strategy is based on using analysis tools, managing to «see the future» with sufficient clarity to be able to define a series of clearly defined actions that lead to optimal positioning. Currently, this is not the case in many cases.
Let's give some examples: was September 11 foreseeable and the impact it was going to have on the world economy? Was the Argentine crisis predictable for companies participating in that market? And the Enron case? Why did the American automotive industry not see the arrival of Japanese competitors? How was Barnes & Noble going to identify Amazon.com's entry as a competitor in book sales? Not all of these changes were unpredictable. Some were predictable, some were "partially" predictable, and some were totally unpredictable, but either case leads to complex situations.
In fact, in unripe sectors, highly innovative companies or newly created companies, uncertainty is the norm. Obviously, in these cases, the development of the strategy is much more complex and also has to be much more flexible.
All this makes many managers think that "strategy is dead" arguing that it is impossible to predict the future and therefore act accordingly. This statement is true if the strategy is seen as a process in which a strategic plan is defined for a window between 3 and 5 years with annual reviews contemplating possible "unforeseeable" changes. In this way, the strategy is obsolete almost before its formulation.
But strategy is not dead if it is seen as a continuous process, a way of "seeing business" and not as a process with a beginning and an end. The strategy should not be something rigid and must be considered as an essential element to make sense of each of the actions that are carried out on a day-to-day basis.
What to do?
In this context, the best recommendation is to insist on the flexibility of the strategy together with a high degree of reflection and participation. It is common to find wrong strategies because they were not well developed and then blame the environment on events that were quite predictable.
For these changing environments, scenario-based and analysis tools have been developed, considering different scenarios and continually analyzing a series of parameters to observe towards which of the scenarios the future tends.
In conclusion, strategy is an indispensable tool in organizations, but the constant changes in the environment make the process of strategic reflection change towards a more participatory and constant line, using much more flexible lines.
