Notes on: Good Strategy Bad Strategy. By Richard Rumelt.

Good strategy acknowledges the challenges being faced and provides an approach to overcoming them. At a high level, strategy is three phases. First, define the problem. Second, determine a guiding policy. Three, create an action plan. Good strategy shows a deep, insightful diagnosis and understanding of the problem. To get better at finding out what the problem is, shift your attention from what is being done, to why it is being done, from directions chosen to the problems that these choices address. A guiding policy is an overall approach chosen to cope with or overcome the obstacles identified in the diagnosis. It is ‘guiding’ because it channels action in certain directions without defining exactly what shall be done. Guiding policies are not goals or visions or images of desirable end states. Rather, they define a method of grappling with the situation and ruling out a vast array of possible actions. A set of coherent actions are steps that are coordinated with one another to work together in accomplishing the guiding policy.

Guiding principles:
1. Good strategy creates strength and opportunity
2. It is coherent, logical and consistent
3. Good strategy is co-ordinated in its application
4. Good strategy is designed based on the strengths it has created and learnings it has learned
5. Good strategy shows a deep, insightful diagnosis and understanding of the problem.
6. Good strategy shows a deep insightful understanding of the people impacted by the problem
7. Good strategy uses resources at hand
8. Good strategy is simple not complex.
9. Good strategy solves a problem
10. Good strategy clearly states the goals, selects one and tells us how we will achieve that goal.