The Hidden Costs of 'No Time for Strategy'
I find ‘We don’t have time for strategy right now’ is almost always said by people who are already living with the consequences of not having one.
I know most people feel they have sensible explanations for endlessly deferring strategy development (there’s too much going on, the landscape is volatile, funding is uncertain, the team is stretched), but over time I constantly see clients, coachees and friends who are exhausted, reactive, scrambling for funding and unclear about how they ended up where they are.
And, that is a consequence of not having a strategy, or engaging with the vital thinking process that is strategy development.
In a polycrisis (political instability, climate breakdown, economic pressure, sector-wide burnout - sound familiar?) strategy is sometimes framed as a luxury, as though it’s something for calmer, more stable times. But that framing is wrong: this is when strategy is most necessary, so we don’t end up defaulting to reaction rather than planning ahead, and we don’t deny ourselves the reflection, ‘taking stock’ and decision making space that strategy development offers.
From what I see with my clients before, during and after strategy processes, I can tell you that operating on default and pushing off strategy is not neutral, it has costs. Those costs are not usually big cataclysmic failures, but little ones stacking up over time, that can look like:
Confusion: it’s difficult to coordinate a group of people towards a goal, and effectively delegate activities, without a clear strategy or plan. People may be confused about the best way to spend their time, or focus their efforts.
Unawareness: if you are not setting and checking your progress against specific strategic goals, you may not be aware of problems that are keeping you from moving forward. You may also be unable to spot potential opportunities, if you do not spend time articulating your priorities.
Distractions: without a specific set of goals to focus on, it’s very easy to get pulled in too many directions, and move from idea to idea, and project to project, without making real progress.
Expense: time is money, and so spending a lot of it can be expensive – but so can spending money on ideas and projects that aren’t strategic, or don’t provide a good return on your investment.
Overwhelm: without a strategy to help you prioritise opportunities and activities, often there can be a feeling of the work ‘never being done’, or there always being too much to do at once.
Unrealistic Expectations: part of developing a strategy is deciding what you want to achieve, and balancing that with what is possible to achieve. Not engaging with that process can lead you, your leadership, or your Board to have unrealistic expectations.
Reactivity: without a strategy to support targeted, proactive fundraising activities, you are likely to always be reacting to the most urgent things, with a feeling of ‘firefighting’. This does not support long-term thinking.
Believe it or not, my wife and I have what we call our ‘Life Strategy’ for the same reason I’m so insistent about organisational ones: without it, we default to reaction. And living in permanent response mode (personally or professionally) is expensive in financial, emotional, and impact terms.
A strategy won’t predict the future, or protect you from economic shocks, funding cuts, or political whiplash, but it gives you a reference point. We can’t eliminate uncertainty, but we can give ourselves structure within which to respond (not react) when we face it.
Worth also saying that good strategy is also an act of care, which we all need right now. In moments like this (aka, the world being on fire), strategy is how you protect your people from being pulled in every direction at once, and urgency becoming your only operating principle. And, it’s how you avoid slowly sanding down your mission in the name of being sustainable / keeping the lights on / staying on the ‘right side’ of problematic external forces.
Whilst money isn’t the only important thing, if priorities are fuzzy, fundraising also becomes scattergun, reactive and less sustainable. If an organisation is operating without clear strategy, fundraising will be too, and won’t be able to innovate or even deliver on Business As Usual. If you can’t articulate what matters most, or specifically what you’re trying to achieve other than ‘still existing in 12 months time’, asking for money becomes far harder than it needs to be, and saying no to the wrong money is impossible.
Whilst it takes investment of time, and sometimes money - strategy really isn’t a luxury. It’s how you choose a direction, and a navigational approach, especially when everything around you feels unstable. It’s fundamentally about choosing, rather than constantly being chosen for. Not necessarily calming chaos, but stopping chaos running the show.