5.

Utilize Strategic Thinking

"Most people spend more time planning their summer vacation than planning their lives."

-SOURCE UNKNOWN When you hear the words "strategic thinking," what comes to mind? Do visions of business plans dance in your head? Do you conjure up marketing plans, the kind that can turn a company around? Perhaps you contemplate global politics. Or you recall some of history's greatest military campaigns: Hannibal crossing the Alps to surprise the Roman army, Charlemagne's conquest of Western Europe, or the Allies' D-Day invasion of Normandy. Perhaps, but strategy doesn't have to be restricted to military action-or even to business. Strategic thinking can make a positive impact on any area of life.

PLAN YOUR LIFE, LIVE YOUR PLAN.

I've observed that most people try to plan their lives one day at a time. They wake up, make up their to-do list, and dive into action (although some people aren't even that strategic).

Fewer individuals plan their lives one week at a time. They review their calendar for the week, check their appointments, review their goals, and then get to work. They generally outachieve most of their daily-planning colleagues. I try to take planning one step further.

At the beginning of every month, I spend half a day working on my calendar for the next forty days. Forty days works for me rather than just thirty. That way, I get a jump on the next month and don't get surprised. I begin by reviewing my travel schedule and planning activities with my family. Then I review what projects, lessons, and other objectives I want to accomplish during those five to six weeks. Then I start blocking out days and times for thinking, writing, working, meeting with people, etc. I set times to do fun things, such as seeing a show, watching a ball game, or playing golf. I also set aside small blocks of time to compensate for the unexpected. By the time I'm done, I can tell you nearly everything I'll be doing, almost hour by hour, during the coming weeks. This strategy is one of the reasons I have been able to accomplish much.

WHY YOU SHOULD RELEASE THE POWER OF STRATEGIC THINKING.

Strategic thinking helps me to plan, to become more efficient, to maximize my strengths, and to find the most direct path toward achieving any objective. The benefits of strategic thinking are numerous. Here are a few of the reasons you should adopt it as one of your thinking tools: 1. Strategic Thinking Simplifies the Difficult Strategic thinking is really nothing more than planning on steroids. Spanish novelist Miguel de Cervantes said, "The man who is prepared has his battle half fought." Strategic thinking takes complex issues and long-term objectives, which can be very difficult to address, and breaks them down into manageable sizes. Anything becomes simpler when it has a plan!

Strategic thinking can also help you simplify the management of everyday life. I do that by using systems, which are nothing more than good strategies repeated. I am well known among pastors and other speakers for my filing system. Writing a lesson or speech can be difficult. But because I use my system to file quotes, stories, and articles, when I need something to flesh out or ill.u.s.trate a point, I simply go to one of my 1,200 files and find a good piece of material that works. Just about any difficult task can be made simpler with strategic thinking.

2. Strategic Thinking Prompts You to Ask the Right Questions Do you want to break down complex or difficult issues? Then ask questions. Strategic thinking forces you through this process. Take a look at the following questions developed by my friend Bobb Biehl, the author of Masterplanning. 8 Direction: What should we do next? Why?

Organization: Who is responsible for what? Who is responsible for whom? Do we have the right people in the right places?

Cash: What is our projected income, expense, net? Can we afford it? How can we afford it?

Tracking: Are we on target?

Overall Evaluation: Are we achieving the quality we expect and demand of ourselves?

Refinement: How can we be more effective and more efficient (move toward the ideal)?

These may not be the only questions you need to ask to begin formulating a strategic plan, but they are certainly a good start.

3. Strategic Thinking Prompts Customization General George S. Patton observed, "Successful generals make plans to fit circ.u.mstances, but do not try to create circ.u.mstances to fit plans."

All good strategic thinkers are precise in their thinking. They try to match the strategy to the problem, because strategy isn't a one-size-fits-all proposition. Sloppy or generalized thinking is an enemy of achievement. The intention to customize in strate-gic thinking forces a person to go beyond vague ideas and engage in specific ways to go after a task or problem. It sharpens the mind.

4. Strategic Thinking Prepares You Today for an Uncertain Tomorrow Strategic thinking is the bridge that links where you are to where you want to be. It gives direction and cred-ibil-ity today and increases your potential for success tomorrow. It is, as Mary Webb suggests, like saddling your dreams before you ride them.

5. Strategic Thinking Reduces the Margin of Error Any time you shoot from the hip or go into a totally reactive mode, you increase your margin for error. It's like a golfer stepping up to a golf ball and hitting it before lining up the shot. Misaligning a shot by just a few degrees can send the ball a hundred yards off target. Strategic thinking, however, greatly reduces that margin for error. It lines up your actions with your objectives, just as lining up a shot in golf helps you to put the ball closer to the pin. The better aligned you are with your target, the better the odds that you will be going in the right direction.

6. Strategic Thinking Gives You Influence with Others One executive confided in another: "Our company has a short range plan and a long range plan. Our short range plan is to stay afloat long enough to make it to our long range plan." That's hardly a strategy, yet that's the position where some business leaders put themselves. There's more than one problem with neglecting strategic thinking in that way. Not only does it fail to build the business, but it also loses the respect of everyone involved with the business.

The one with the plan is the one with the power. It doesn't matter in what kind of activity you're involved. Employees want to follow the business leader with a good business plan. Volunteers want to join the pastor with a good ministry plan. Children want to be with the adult who has the well-thought-out vacation plan. If you practice strategic thinking, others will listen to you and they will want to follow you. If you possess a position of leadership in an organization, strategic thinking is essential.

HOW TO RELEASE THE POWER OFSTRATEGIC THINKING.

To become a better strategic thinker able to formulate and implement plans that will achieve the desired objective, take the following guidelines to heart: 1. Break Down the Issue The first step in strategic thinking is to break down an issue into smaller, more manageable parts so that you can focus on them more effectively. How you do it is not as important as just doing it. You might break an issue down by function. That's what automotive innovator Henry Ford did when he created the a.s.sembly line, and that's why he said, "Nothing is particularly hard if you divide it into small jobs."

How you break down an issue is up to you, whether it's by function, timetable, responsibility, purpose, or some other method. The point is that you need to break it down. Only one person in a million can juggle the whole thing in his head and think strategically to create solid, viable plans.

2. Ask Why Before How When most people begin using strategic thinking to solve a problem or plan a way to meet an objective, they often make the mistake of jumping the gun and trying immediately to figure out how to accomplish it. Instead of asking how, they should first ask why. If you jump right into problem solving mode, how are you going to know all the issues?

Eugene G. Grace says, "Thousands of engineers can design bridges, calculate strains and stresses, and draw up specifications for machines, but the great engineer is the man who can tell whether the bridge or the machine should be built at all, where it should be built, and when." Asking why helps you to think about all the reasons for decisions. It helps you to open your mind to possibilities and opportunities. The size of an opportunity often determines the level of resources and effort that you must invest. Big opportunities allow for big decisions. If you jump to how too quickly, you might miss that.

3. Identify the Real Issues and Objectives William Feather, author of The Business of Life, said, "Before it can be solved, a problem must be clearly defined." Too many people rush to solutions, and as a result they end up solving the wrong problem. To avoid that, ask probing questions to expose the real issues. Challenge all of your a.s.sumptions. Collect information even after you think you've identified the issue. (You may still have to act with incomplete data, but you don't want to jump to a conclusion before you gather enough information to begin identifying the real issue.) Begin by asking, What else could be the real issue? You should also remove any personal agenda. More than almost anything else, that can cloud your judgment. Discovering your real situation and objectives is a major part of the battle. Once the real issues are identified, the solutions are often simple.

4. Review Your Resources I already mentioned how impor-tant it is to be aware of your re-sources, but it bears repeating. A strategy that doesn't take into account resources is doomed to failure. Take an inventory. How much time do you have? How much money? What kinds of materials, supplies, or inventory do you have? What are your other a.s.sets? What liabilities or obligations will come into play? Which people on the team can make an impact? You know your own organization and profession. Figure out what resources you have at your disposal.

5. Develop Your Plan How you approach the planning process depends greatly on your profession and the size of the challenge that you're planning to tackle, so it's difficult to recommend many specifics. However, no matter how you go about planning, take this advice: start with the obvious. When you tackle an issue or plan that way, it brings unity and consensus to the team, because everyone sees those things. Obvious elements build mental momentum and initiate creativity and intensity. The best way to create a road to the complex is to build on the fundamentals.

6. Put the Right People in the Right Place It's critical that you include your team as part of your strategic thinking. Before you can implement your plan, you must make sure that you have the right people in place. Even the best strategic thinking won't help if you don't take into account the people part of the equation. Look at what happens if you miscalculate: Wrong Person: Problems instead of Potential Wrong Place: Frustration instead of Fulfillment Wrong Plan: Grief instead of Growth Everything comes together, however, when you put together all three elements: the right person, the right place, and the right plan.

7. Keep Repeating the Process My friend Olan Hendrix remarked, "Strategic thinking is like showering, you have to keep doing it." If you expect to solve any major problem once, you're in for disappointment. Little things can be won easily through systems and personal discipline. But major issues need major strategic thinking time. What Thane Yost said is really true: "The will to win is worthless if you do not have the will to prepare." If you want to be an effective strategic thinker, then you need to become a continuous strategic thinker.

As I was working on this chapter, I came across an article in my local paper on the celebration of the Jewish Pa.s.sover and how millions of American Jews read the order of service for their Seder, or Pa.s.sover meal, from a small booklet produced by Maxwell House Coffee. For more than seventy years, the coffee company has produced the booklet, called a Haggada, and during those years it has distributed more than 40 million copies of it.

"I remember using them all my life," said Regina Witt, who is in her fifties. So does her mother, who is almost ninety. "It's our tradition. I think it would be very strange not to use them." 9 So how did Maxwell House come to supply the booklets? It was the result of strategic thinking. Eighty years ago, marketing man Joseph Jacobs advised that the company could sell coffee during Pa.s.sover if the product were certified Kosher by a rabbi. (Since 1923, Maxwell House coffee has been certified Kosher for Pa.s.sover.) And then Jacobs suggested that if they gave away the Haggada booklets, they could increase sales. 10 They've been creating the booklets-and selling coffee during Pa.s.sover-ever since. That's what can happen when you unleash the power of strategic thinking.

Thinking Question

Am I implementing strategic plans that give me direction for today and increase my potential for tomorrow?

6.

Explore Possibility Thinking

"Nothing is so embarra.s.sing as watching someone do something that you said could not be done."

-SAM EWING People who embrace possibility thinking are capable of accomplishing tasks that seem impossible because they believe in solutions. Here are several reasons why you should become a possibility thinker: 1. Possibility Thinking Increases Your Possibilities When you believe you can do something difficult-and you succeed-many doors open for you. When George Lucas succeeded in making Star Wars, despite those who said the special effects he wanted hadn't ever been done and couldn't be done, many other possibilities opened up to him. Industrial Light and Magic (ILM), the company he created to produce those "impossible" special effects, became a source of revenue to help underwrite his other projects. He was able to produce merchandising tie-ins to his movies, thus bringing in another revenue stream to fund his movie making. But his confidence in doing the difficult has also made a huge impact on other movie makers and a whole new generation of movie goers. Popular culture writer Chris Sale-wicz a.s.serts, "At first directly through his own work and then via the unparalleled influence of ILM, George Lucas has dictated for two decades the essential broad notion of what is cinema." 11 If you open yourself up to possibility thinking, you open yourself up to many other possibilities.

2. Possibility Thinking Draws Opportunities and People to You The case of George Lucas helps you to see how being a possibility thinker can create new opportunities and attract people. People who think big attract big people to them. If you want to achieve big things, you need to become a possibility thinker.

3. Possibility Thinking Increases Others' Possibilities Big thinkers who make things happen also create possibilities for others. That happens, in part, because it's contagious. You can't help but become more confident and think bigger when you're around possibility thinkers.

4. Possibility Thinking Allows You to Dream Big Dreams No matter what your profession, pos-sibility thinking can help you to broaden your horizons and dream bigger dreams. Professor David J. Schwartz believes, "Big thinkers are specialists in creating positive forward-looking, optimistic pictures in their own minds and in the minds of others." If you embrace possibility thinking, your dreams will go from molehill to mountain size, and because you believe in possibilities, you put yourself in position to achieve them.

5. Possibility Thinking Makes It Possible to Rise Above Average During the 1970s, when oil prices went through the roof, automobile makers were ordered to make their cars more fuel efficient. One manufacturer asked a group of senior engineers to drastically reduce the weight of cars they were designing. They worked on the problem and searched for solutions, but they finally concluded that making lighter cars couldn't be done, would be too expensive, and would present too many safety concerns. They couldn't get out of the rut of their average thinking.

What was the auto maker's solution? They gave the problem to a group of less-experienced engineers. The new group found ways to reduce the weight of the company's automobiles by hundreds of pounds. Because they thought that solving the problem was possible, it was. Every time you remove the label of impossible from a task, you raise your potential from average to off the charts.

6. Possibility Thinking Gives You Energy A direct correlation exists between possibility thinking and the level of a person's energy. Who gets energized by the prospect of losing? If you know something can't succeed, how much time and energy are you willing to give it? n.o.body goes looking for a lost cause. You invest yourself in what you believe can succeed. When you embrace possibility thinking, you believe in what you're doing, and that gives you energy.

7. Possibility Thinking Keeps You from Giving Up Above all, possibility thinkers believe they can succeed. Denis Waitley, author of The Psychology of Winning, says, "The winners in life think constantly in terms of 'I can, I will and I am.' Losers, on the other hand, concentrate their waking thoughts on what they should have done, or what they don't do." If you believe you can't do something, then it doesn't matter how hard you try, because you've already lost. If you believe you can do something, you have already won much of the battle.

One of the people who showed himself to be a great possibility thinker in 2001 was New York mayor Rudy Giuliani. In the hours following the World Trade Center tragedy, Giuliani not only led the city through the chaos of the disaster, but he instilled confidence in everyone he touched. Afterward, he gave some insight and perspective on his experience:

I was so proud of the people I saw on the street. No chaos, but they were frightened and confused, and it seemed to me that they needed to hear from my heart where I thought we were going. I was trying to think, Where can I go for some comparison to this, some lessons about how to handle it? So I started thinking about Churchill, started thinking that we're going to have to rebuild the spirit of the city, and what better example than Churchill and the people of London during the Blitz in 1940, who had to keep up their spirit during this sustained bombing? It was a comforting thought. 12

Sixteen hours after the planes struck the buildings in New York City, when Giuliani finally returned at 2:30 A.M. to his apartment for a rest, instead of sleeping, he read the World War II chapters of Churchill: A Biography by Roy Jenkins. He learned how Winston Churchill helped his people to see the possibilities and kept his people going. Inspired, Giuliani did the same for his own people six decades later.

HOW TO FEEL THE ENERGY OFPOSSIBILITY THINKING.

If you are a naturally positive person who already embraces possibility thinking, then you're already tracking with me. However, some people, rather than being optimistic, are naturally negative or cynical. They believe that possibility thinkers are nave or foolish. If your thinking runs toward pessimism, let me ask you a question: how many highly successful people do you know who are continually negative? How many impossibility thinkers are you acquainted with who achieve big things? None!

People with an it-can't-be-done mindset have two choices. They can expect the worst and continually experience it; or they can change their thinking. That's what George Lucas did. Believe it or not, even though he is a possibility thinker, he is not a naturally positive person. He says, "I'm very cynical, and as a result, I think the defense I have against it is to be optimistic." 13 In other words, he chooses to think positively. He sums it up this way: "As corny as it sounds, the power of positive thinking goes a long way. So determination and positive thinking combined with talent combined with knowing your craft... that may sound like a nave point of view, but at the same time it's worked for me and it's worked for all my friends-so I have come to believe it." 14 If you want possibility thinking to work for you, then begin by following these suggestions: 1. Stop Focusing on the Impossibilities The first step in becoming a possibility thinker is to stop yourself from searching for and dwelling on what's wrong with any given situation. Sports psychologist Bob Rotella recounts, "I tell people: If you don't want to get into positive thinking, that's OK. Just eliminate all the negative thoughts from your mind, and whatever's left will be fine."

If possibility thinking is new to you, you're going to have to give yourself a lot of coaching to eliminate some of the negative self-talk you may hear in your head. When you automatically start listing all the things that can go wrong or all the reasons something can't be done, stop yourself and say, "Don't go there." Then ask, "What's right about this?" That will help to get you started. And if negativity is a really big problem for you and pessimistic things come out of your mouth before you've even thought them through, you may need to enlist the aid of a friend or family member to alert you every time you utter negative ideas.

2. Stay Away from the "Experts"

So-called experts do more to shoot down people's dreams than just about anybody else.

Possibility thinkers are very reluctant to dismiss anything as impossible. Rocket pioneer Wernher von Braun said, "I have learned to use the word impossible with the greatest of caution." And Napoleon Bonaparte declared, "The word impossible is not in my dictionary." If you feel you must take the advice of an expert, however, then heed the words of John Andrew Holmes, who a.s.serted, "Never tell a young person that something cannot be done. G.o.d may have been waiting centuries for somebody ignorant enough of the impossible to do that thing." If you want to achieve something, give yourself permission to believe it is possible-no matter what experts might say.

3. Look for Possibilities in Every Situation Becoming a possibility thinker is more than just refusing to let yourself be negative. It's something more. It's looking for positive possibilities despite the circ.u.mstances. I recently heard Don Soderquist, former president of Wal-Mart, tell a wonderful story that ill.u.s.trates how a person can find positive possibilities in any situation. Soderquist had gone with Sam Walton to Huntsville, Alabama, to open several new stores. While there, Walton suggested they visit the compet.i.tion. Here's what Soderquist said happened: 15

We went into one [store], and I have to tell you that it was the worst store I've ever seen in my life. It was terrible. There were no customers. There was no help on the floor. The aisles were cluttered with merchandise, empty shelves, dirty, it was absolutely terrible. He [Walton] walked one way and I'd walk the other way and we'd kind of meet out on the sidewalk. He said, "What'd you think, Don?"

I said, "Sam, that is the absolutely worst store I've ever seen in my life. I mean, did you see the aisles?"

He said, "Don, did you see the pantyhose rack?"

I said, "No, I didn't, Sam. I must have gone on a different aisle than you. I didn't see that."

He said, "That was the best pantyhose rack I've ever seen, Don." And he said, "I pulled the fixture out and on the back was the name of the manufacturer. When we get back, I want you to call that manufacturer and have him come in and visit with our fixture people. I want to put that rack in our stores. It's absolutely the best I've ever seen." And he said next, "Did you see the ethnic cosmetics?"

I said, "Sam, that must have been right next to the pantyhose rack, because I absolutely missed that."

He said, "Don, do you realize that in our stores we have four feet of ethnic cosmetics. These people had 12 feet of it. We are absolutely missing the boat. I wrote down the distributor of some of those products. When we get back, I want you to get a hold of our cosmetic buyer and get these people in. We absolutely need to expand our ethnic cosmetics."

Now, Sam Walton didn't hit me on the head and say, "Don, now what lesson did you learn from this?" He had already hit me on the head by looking for the good, looking how to improve, striving for excellence. It's so easy to go and look at what other people do badly. But one of the leadership characteristics of vision that he showed me, and I'll never forget it, is look for the good in what other people are doing and apply it.

It doesn't take a genius IQ or twenty years of experience to find the possibility in every situation. All it takes is the right att.i.tude, and anybody can cultivate that.

4. Dream One Size Bigger One of the best ways to cultivate a possibility mind-set is to prompt yourself to dream one size bigger than you normally do. Let's face it: most people dream too small. They don't think big enough. Henry Curtis advises, "Make your plans as fantastic as you like, because twenty-five years from now, they will seem mediocre. Make your plans ten times as great as you first planned, and twenty-five years from now you will wonder why you did not make them fifty times as great."