Structure for a framework about corporate strategy

Question

Hello, I would like to know what could be a good MECE framework to define the strategy of a company. I am looking for a general framework, which can serve as a guide to know what kind of things to analyse.

I can think of:

As-Is: Make a diagnosis of the current situation. But what kind of things?
GAP-Analysis: main problems to solve or things that are far from the best practices of the market.
To-Be: objectives and strategy to achieve them.

But it seems to me a very simple framework. Is there any recommendation of something more complete?

Answer 1

Hey,

I think you are pretty much on the mark. Let me improve it a bit.

Steps to define a corporate strategy

As-Is - Conduct external analysis to identify key trends in the industry and ecosystem. Assess the organisation's internal strengths, weaknesses and capabilities
Choices- Synthesise the insights from the internal and external analysis and formulate scenarios about the future. Prioritise the scenarios based on their value impact and make choices about where the organisation wants to focus
Define- Deep dive into the strategic choices , create execution roadmap and investment needs

Very similar approach can be used to create a focused strategy e.g. Customer, Product, Competitor etc.

Answer 2

Hi Richard,

This is sort of just a stable stakes framework. This is literally what you would do for any project/case. In every single case/problem you're going "whats the current state, what do I have to do, and how do I prioritize and implement them".

You haven't added any value here...

Rather, you have to think about the objective + client + industry all together to create a tailored framework. What does this look like? It depends!

When you say "corporate strategy", this could literally be anything! We need to know what exact strategy we're aiming for (culture change? digital transformation? Growth? cost cutting?). Then and only then can we create a tailored framework based on content NOT process.

Answer 3

Hello!

To add on top of what has been said -and approving very much your framework-, this brings into my mind something that my Competitive Strategy professor used to say: strategy is the bridge between where a company is atm and where it wants to be.

Cheers,

Clara