Strategy Is Everyone's Job : A Guide to Strategic Leadership

If you think strategy is just for the executive team or CEO, think again. In reality, strategy is everyone s job. Every individual inside the organization is linked to the success of the business and plays a part in the firm s strategy mosaic. Everyone in the organization should be asking themselves, How do I add value to the business? Who are my customers How do I drive benefits? How does my function contribute to the competitive advantage of the organization in the marketplace? To harvest strategic opportunities or avert potential hazards, each function, team, and person needs to answer these questions and take responsibility for delivering results today while formulating and implementing the strategic changes that will shape the future.

Leaders at all levels of the business play a key role in modeling a strategic approach because they set the stage and provide the direction for team members to follow as the future unfolds. Following their example, others can see how they, too, can engage in strategic thought and action. These leaders and middle managers are catalysts for fostering strategic behavior from the bottom up while aligning with senior leaders and the overall organization strategy. For that to happen, leaders have to work on the business, not just in the business. Strategy is Everyone s Job introduces a practical process that all leaders and individuals can use to identify strategic opportunities and create and execute their own, unique, stand-alone strategy that supports and aligns with the overarching strategy of the business. Working at a strategic level is a desirable leader competency, but how well are you and leaders in your organization doing it? Do they even know what it means to be strategic or how to develop and execute a strategy for their domain? Strategy is Everyone s Job provides leaders with tools to motivate, coach, and inspire people to make a strategic contribution. This is what organizations need from their leaders if they are to navigate a sea of change, achieve new sources of competitive advantage, and foster a forward-looking and proactive culture.

So whether you are a formal leader or an individual contributor wanting to take the lead and shape a strategic journey for your part of the business, the skills and processes in this book will help you discover how to create a strategy and a vision for the future in a practical and organized way. Strategy is Everyone s Job will help you figure out how you can be the difference in your organization s long-term success.

Dr. Steven J. Stowell is the Co-Founder of the Center for Management and Organization Effectiveness, Inc. The Center was created in 1978 for the purpose of helping individuals and teams maximize their effectiveness and competitiveness. Steve's special interests lie in helping develop leaders, building teamwork, resolving conflicts, creating effective relationships, and transforming traditional organizations into high performance systems. Dr. Stowell is a highly effective presenter and facilitator whose work is known world wide. He enjoys creating customized solutions, assisting senior teams, defining strategic direction, and improving teams that are faced with serious challenges and issues. Stephanie Mead has spent her career in administration management, consulting, management development curriculum design, and international operations. Stephanie has designed and created internal organizational policy, worked with organization in diagnosing training and development needs, facilitated team building workshops, conducted organization research, and supervised joint ventures. Stephanie has designed many leadership development workshops on the topics such as Training and Developing Employees, Managing Change, Staffing, and Performance Development. Stephanie lives in Draper, Utah with her husband and three daughters.