Why is it sometimes difficult to come up with a good strategy?

Coming up with a strategy feels sometime difficult to achieve. There are some common points, that are recurrent.

Lack of Internal Expertise: Organizations may lack the in-house expertise and experience required to develop a comprehensive and effective strategic plan. They may need external assistance to bridge this knowledge gap. This is because they are good in running thing, repeating standard businesses processes over and over again. Setting the path into a new direction does not happen so often.

Limited Time and Resources: Building a strategic plan can be time-consuming and resource-intensive. Many organizations are already stretched thin with day-to-day operations, making it difficult to allocate sufficient time and resources for strategy development. I have experienced this firsthand many times. If several streams run in parallel experts are well booked. Finding a slot to brainstorm, analyse or discuss can be a challenge.

Objective Perspective: External facilitators can provide an objective viewpoint or simply questions that internal stakeholders may not have. This can help uncover blind spots, challenge assumptions, and encourage innovative thinking. From my point of view, this is the biggest gamechanger.

Conflicting Priorities: Different departments or teams within the organization may have conflicting priorities or agendas. Strategy always means to shift funds and resources. There are always winners and loosers. An external moderator can help mediate discussions, align goals, and ensure that the strategy reflects the organization's overall objectives.

Stakeholder Alignment: Ensuring that all key stakeholders are aligned and on board with the strategic plan can be challenging. External facilitators can help facilitate discussions, gather input, and ensure that diverse perspectives are considered.

Resistance to Change: Employees and leadership may resist change that comes with a new strategic plan. An external moderator can insist of following a process and aligning the participants along the way. The moderator can also easier ask for committment from each participants at the end of the process. This is what masters do. They gently use a little peer pressure to entice a committment in public. The goal is, that the leaders support each other in implementing the strategy.

Complexity of the Process: Developing a strategic plan involves multiple steps, including environmental analysis, goal setting, action planning, and performance measurement. External moderators can help simplify the process and guide organizations through each stage. Personally I would always poll the organizations beforehand for observations, ideas and trends. That involves a larger audience and provides the diversity of thought wich is needed along the way.

Clarity and Communication: Ensuring that the strategic plan is clear, concise, and effectively communicated to all stakeholders is critical. To distill complex ideas into actionable strategies, a compelling narrative and a communication plan might better work together with external help.

Accountability and Implementation: Organizations may struggle with the execution of the strategic plan. This is because of the deviation from the status quo. To engage the whole organization requires a lot of communication and support to help every employee to support the new strategy.

Measuring Success: Determining how to measure the success of the strategic plan and track progress can be challenging. There are always assumptions for the strategy. Measuring early indicators is not always easy or possible.

Adaptation to Change: We humas are creature of stability. Developing another mindset is not the same as developing new habits. To make change easy change the context in a way that makes change easy for everyone.

Risk Management: Identifying and addressing potential risks and challenges that may arise any time of the strategic plan is crucial. Any strategy is a bet. Changes in the environment can happen as well as figuring out the wrong basis for the actions. Therefore is very helpful to concentrate on a few doable although difficult initiatives.