GOOD STRATEGY BAD STRATEGY: The Difference and W

Clears out the mumbo jumbo and muddled thinking underlying too many strategies and provides a clear way to create and implement a powerful action-oriented strategy for the real world Developing and implementing a strategy is the central task of a leader, whether the CEO at a Fortune 100 company, an entrepreneur, a church pastor, the head of a school, or a government official.

Richard Rumelt shows that there has been a growing and unfortunate tendency to equate Mom-and-apple-pie values, fluffy packages of buzzwords, motivational slogans, and financial goals with strategy. He debunks these elements of bad strategy and awakens an understanding of the power of a good strategy.

A good strategy is a specific and coherent response to--and approach for overcoming--the obstacles to progress. A good strategy works by harnessing and applying power where it will have the greatest effect in challenges as varied as putting a man on the moon, fighting a war, launching a new product, responding to changing market dynamics, starting a charter school, or setting up a government program. Rumelt's nine sources of power--ranging from using leverage to effectively focusing on growth--are eye-opening yet pragmatic tools that can be put to work on Monday morning. Surprisingly, a good strategy is often unexpected because most organizations don't have one. Instead, they have visions, mistake financial goals for strategy, and pursue a dog's dinner of conflicting policies and actions. Rumelt argues that the heart of a good strategy is insight--into the true nature of the situation, into the hidden power in a situation, and into an appropriate response. He shows you how insight can be cultivated with a wide variety of tools for guiding your own thinking.