Strategy in Practice: A Practitioner's Guide to Strategic Thinking, 3rd Edition

Appendix BStrategy Mapping and Narrative (based on Analysis of the Relevant Strategy Building Blocks)

In Appendix B, We:

• derive a practical approach for mapping the firm's strategy on the basis of an analysis of its relevant strategy building blocks;
• extend the strategy mapping outcome to include an accompanying narrative that seeks to articulate the firm's strategy;
• provide guidance on deriving an appropriate “three-minute elevator pitch” that captures and expresses the essence of the firm's strategy “in a nutshell.”

Strategy Mapping

A number of approaches exist for mapping the firm's strategy.¹ Often these appear in conjunction with strategic performance measurement and monitoring. In this section we develop an approach for distilling and consolidating the essence of the firm's strategy in a way that can be easily understood and communicated. It builds on the outcomes of the preceding analysis (Appendix A) to the extent that it elaborates on and extends the outcomes of the analysis of the firm's unique competing space. The approach examined in this section enhances the foregoing analysis with an appropriate “reason to believe”; moreover, it derives an accompanying narrative that enables a clear statement of the firm's strategy. The approach developed in this section draws on the strategy building blocks introduced in Chapter 1.

Strategy mapping and the accompanying narrative are critically important for strategic thinking. They are particularly important for communicating ...