A good strategy includes a set of coherent actions. They are not “implementation” details; they are the punch in the strategy. A strategy that fails to define a variety of plausible and feasible immediate actions is missing a critical component.

It contended, “All too much of what is put forward as strategy is not. The basic problem is confusion between strategy and strategic goals.

Like Harvester’s, they do not identify and come to grips with the fundamental obstacles and problems that stand in the organization’s way. Looking at most of this product, or listening to the managers who have produced it, you will find an almost total lack of strategic thinking. Instead, you will find high-sounding sentiments together with plans to spend more and somehow “get better.

A great deal of strategy work is trying to figure out what is going on. Not just deciding what to do, but the more fundamental problem of comprehending the situation.

But good strategy looks past these issues to what is fundamental. From that perspective, the threats to the company are not specific new products or competitive moves, but changes that undermine the logic of its design.