The Rise and Fall of Strategic Planning

Summary

The classic takedown of strategy as prediction: management thinker Henry Mintzberg argues that ‘strategic planning’ is a contradiction, because planning is analysis and strategy is synthesis. He names three fallacies – that disruptions can be predicted, that strategists can stand apart from the work, and that strategy-making can be formalised – and looks instead to informal learning and personal vision.

Rationale

His second fallacy, that strategists can be detached from the work, has a twin in our own caution: we can’t “stand outside the culture analysing it objectively” either.