Learning to make strategy: Balancing discipline and imagination

Companies learn how to make strategy by doing. Most companies have few occasions to learn, however, because strategy making is typically a sporadic exercise undertaken only during major discontinuities. In a reality where the value of new strategies erodes rapidly, companies must pay attention to how fast and how well they are able to create new strategies and migrate to them. Advice for strategy making emphasises either discipline (e.g., rigorous, elaborate planning) or imagination (e.g., attempts to think outside the box). Neither discipline nor imagination alone, however, is as effective as both are together. In this article, the authors review the strengths and limitations of both discipline and imagination, and conclude by discussing ways in which companies can balance discipline and imagination in their strategy making. (C) 2001 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.