Strategic thinking! Ever heard of it in the organizational context? Strategic planning! Oh yes, it is something often attributed as an important leadership task. Every organization has strategic planners, who derive a meaningful interpretation for the organization from the evolving trends in the marketplace and develop various possibilities for the organization. Leadership role is at best that of a facilitator here.

Real leadership role emerges from digging a bit deeper. Meaningful interpretation comes from keen examination and analysis of environmental changes against specific ideas. These are the ideas that define an organization’s existence and shape its future. This brings us to the core of the discussion - with out any second opinion, leaders are source of great business ideas. Ideas result from the ability of leaders to think strategically. How do leaders develop this ability of thinking strategically? Leaders should develop clear insights on markets, customers and technology. They should constantly reflect on their experience and seek new information on emerging realities to develop a significant view point of future. Strategically thinking leaders transcend the boundaries – beyond current markets, customers and technologies.

As John Adair says strategic thinking is about thinking centred on end and means. Not only do they develop a definitive view point of the future, they also shape the culture – defining the behaviours necessary to pursue the path. Formulating strategic vision and defining core values is certainly the manifestation of strategic thinking. Strategic planning is not strategic thinking. Strategic planning is following up on strategic thinking. Clarity in thinking leads to great strategic plans.

Undoubtedly, imagination of strategic thinkers has no bounds. Yet strategic thinking is not about wild dreams. Leaders who think strategically have judicious mix of creative and critical thinking. Creative thinking helps such leaders develop new ideas and critical thinking helps them judge these ideas on their worth. Creative thinking is about new ideas and critical thinking is about picking up practical ideas, together they make leaders, strategic thinkers.

Strategic thinking can not be taught but it can be learnt through observation and practice. So what are the essential features that characterise such leaders is what is discussed below.

Flexibility is an essential feature of leaders who think strategically. Flexibility is not about changing the goals, it is about abandoning fixed ideas, it is about thinking of array of possible solutions, never thought of before and all the while retaining constancy of purpose. This happens when leaders are willing to look at problems from all possible angles and question inherent assumptions. Flexibility allows leaders to redefine complex problems, which provides insights into more feasible solutions. Jack Welch encouraging his managers to challenge his ideas at Crotonville, while he was CEO at GE, is an example of a confident leader with a flexible attitude.

Cognition is yet another feature of strategic thinkers. This means that a leader must develop business wisdom by acquiring knowledge through perception, reasoning and intuition. An example that can be cited here is that of Lou Gestner, the turnaround CEO of IBM. He quickly developed understanding of the business through planned interactions with customers, competitors and employees. Thus building upon his own perceptions of IBM as a supplier for his previous company.

Anticipation gives strategic leaders to proactively manage change before they are forced to change. One such example that comes to the mind is that of leadership at Tata Steel in India which managed a successful change in technology portfolio backed up by a highly successful right sizing exercise to enhance its competitiveness to such an extent that during the downturn in steel industry during middle and late 1990s, Tata Steel was the only steel company in the world which was profitable.

Leaders who are strategic thinkers not only learn from their own experience, they also have the ability to draw analogy from others experience. A classic case often cited in this context is of Andrew Grove of Intel, who taking cue from steel industry, where established steel companies allowed mini mills in the low end segment of rebars, but with time mini mills made their way into high end segments as well, insisted that if Intel leaves the cheap PC market uncontested it may lose the high end subsequently. As a consequence, Intel promoted its Celeron processors more aggressively in the low end segment.

However in a highly complex and ambiguous environment, no amount of cognition, reasoning and anticipation may help leaders, it is ultimately their instinct that comes to their rescue. Instinct is that attribute of strategically thinking leaders which enables them to zero down on a certain line of thinking. Picking up a winning idea in such situations comes from business wisdom acquired over the years. This is what we call gut feeling – it is not trial and error. Success of instinctive decisions goes hand in hand with flexibility and cognition as leaders review their thinking process and validity of their ideas for desirable impact and improving upon the ideas.

Clarity in leader’s thinking is the most important aspect as clarity in strategic thinking leads to clear strategic plans. Measure for a leader’s strategic thinking is whether or not it influences the way people think about what is possible, desirable and necessary.