Down Range: A Transitioning Veteran's Career Guide to Life's Next Phase

Chapter 5

Identify Your Resources

Six Steps of Planning

1. Determine the mission objective.

2. Identify the threats.

3. Identify your resources.

4. Evaluate lessons learned.

5. Develop a course of action.

6. Plan for contingencies.

Business strategy, like military strategy, requires considerable thought, insight, and decision making. Although business scholars often disagree on how to define strategy, most agree on a single aspect of what strategy requires: the careful application of resources. We believe that strategy is simply expressed as the means, or the path, to achieve your goal. In your case, the goal is your career high-definition destination (HDD). Your path may be straightforward or it may be complex. Regardless, strategy should be expressed simply and in terms of the careful consideration of threats, as we have reviewed in the previous chapter, as well as a careful consideration of resources.

Apple founder Steve Jobs demonstrated the impact of resources on the basic principle of strategy when he said, “I'm as proud of what we don't do as I am of what we do.” His was a clear and memorable statement of the significance of resource constraints and intentional decision-making. He understood the value of focus.

You too, must focus your resources on your HDD. Your experience has given you a wealth of strengths, tools, and relationships, but you must employ them wisely, in ways that help you achieve your goals. You also don't have the resources to do everything. As you plan ...