Leaders Need to Get Comfortable Collaborating on Strategy

Traditional models of strategy making don’t take advantage of what the age of the internet makes possible in terms of sourcing innovative ideas. That’s partly because many executives take a narrow view of the process, fearing that if they open it up they will muddle decision-making. They may also fear that they only will expose their ignorance by reaching out for ideas. And finally they worry that the whole process will become unmanageable. Leaders who fall into these traps lose out.  Instead, CEOs should map their process out to see where they’re short of ideas — most likely in the information-gathering stage — then treat that part of strategy-making as a process of exploring and discovering what they don’t know, like an exercise in innovation, and, finally, embrace the volume and complexity of the ideas they receive.