Figure 4 illustrates three dimensions to thinking:
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Time: we think across time in the past, the present, and the future. |
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Substance: we think between the concrete and the abstract. |
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Cardinality: we may think about one or more issues concurrently. |
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Assessment |
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Alliances |
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Structure |
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Indirection |
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Speed |
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Strategic conflict |
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Self invincibility |
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Prescience |
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Formlessness |
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Positioning |
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Commitment |
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Maneuver |
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Leadership |
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Efficiency |
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Coordination |
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Discipline |
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Psychological conflict |
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Foreknowledge |
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Love of the people |
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Learning |
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Chooses a problem (or set of problems). |
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Samples strategic ideas (singularly and simultaneously). |
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Thinks about solving the problem(s) by applying the strategic ideas within the Figure 5 bubble. This demands intuitive, holistic, dynamic and abstract thinking. |
Key Points
- There are three dimensions to thinking:
- Most of the time we engage in mundane thinking. We need to process issues one at a time.
- Strategic thinking requires us to think dynamically across all dimensions.
- All strategic ideas encourage one grand strategic idea-the building, sustaining, and extending of advantage.
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Time |
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Substance |
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Cardinality |
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Most of the time, most of us, as illustrated in Figure 4, engage in mundane thinking to solve our daily problems. All we need to do, to meet our needs, is to think about one issue, in the present, and in the concrete, at a time. Anything more sophisticated would be overkill. This thinking pattern that we use to solve our daily problems is also referred to as point thinking because all our problem solving efforts converge on one point.
Figure 5 illustrates strategic thinking. A strategist uses the same dimensions as the mundane thinker but thinks dynamically within the thought bubble defined by those three dimensions. A strategist concurrently thinks about many issues in multiple dimensions at many levels of abstraction and detail over time (past, present, and future). Strategic thinking is a creative and dynamic synthesis that is the exact opposite of point thinking. 数据挖掘工具
When looking at a problem, a strategist thinks about it in terms of certain established strategic ideas or themes. While new perspectives can always be developed, time and experience have demonstrated the power of looking at problems through certain enduring and tested strategic lenses. The following is a partial and representative list of powerful strategic ideas (see appendix for definitions): 数据挖掘工具
All these themes, not surprisingly, converge on one grand strategic idea-the building, sustaining, and extending of advantage.
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So a strategic thinker:
Since the combinations of strategic ideas is inexhaustible, strategic thinking is a very powerful way to develop insight about problems and solve them in novel, unanticipated, and creative ways. It is from this kind of thinking that advantage is born and nourished.
