Strategy is a young field of expertise. And the time has come for strategy to grow up and learn from other professions. Reports and plans are sometimes needed. But prototyping will help you craft better strategies to master the art of creating and making strategic choices.
Firstly, prototyping will help you explore creative ideas and investigate multiple strategic options in parallel. Applying a “building to think” mindset across the early stages of strategy will fuel creativity. Secondly, prototyping serves as an important method to validate and learn about key uncertainties and critical assumptions. Thirdly, co-creating vivid pictures of possible futures and tangible prototypes will increase shared understanding and deliver higher engagement across the organisation.
Strategy is not about perfection but rather about making choices that will shorten the odds of success. And the best way to improve the odds is to test drive the strategic options as quickly as possible. Mistakes made early in the strategy process are very cheap, while they can be devastatingly costly at a later stage if the wrong strategy is implemented.
Invest a little in prototyping to learn a lot - and to make possible futures feel alive.
Dogma perspectives
We asked a few of our colleagues for their perspectives on not planning for the future, but designing it – here is what they said.