Dean Scott Beardsley: Advice

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From the course by University of Virginia

Strategic Planning and Execution

207 ratings

University of Virginia

Strategic Planning and Execution

207 ratings

Course 4 of 5 in the Specialization Business Strategy

Avoid the pitfalls of strategy planning and execution with the tools and skills from this course. You'll learn the pillars of strategy execution--analysis, formulation, and implementation--and how to use the 4A model to effectively approach strategy execution. Finally, a panel of leaders from entrepreneurs, nonprofits, and industry, share their expertise gleaned from years of successful strategy planning and execution.

From the lesson

Practical Perspectives

This week we welcome guest speakers from a range of industries, from startups to nonprofits, to share their expertise from years of successful strategy development and execution. They'll communicate their best tips to help you develop your strategist's toolkit. We're also fortunate to be joined by Darden's Dean Scott Beardsley, whose 26 years with McKinsey informs the concrete tips he shares to improve strategy development and execution.

Dean Scott Beardsley: Background2:51

Dean Scott Beardsley: Perspective14:05

Dean Scott Beardsley: Process6:28

Dean Scott Beardsley: Advice4:34

Meet the Instructors

Michael Lenox
Senior Associate Dean and Chief Strategy Officer
Darden School of Business
Jared Harris
Samuel L. Slover Research Chair in Business Administration
Darden School of Business
Scott Snell
E. Thayer Bigelow Research Professor in Business Administration
Darden School of Business

The advice I would have for

anybody that wants to consider going into strategy is several fold.

The first is that you really need to understand what strategy,

the word strategy means in the context you maybe considering.

I have come to see over the years that the way I define strategy and

that I shared with you, which is to say the way also that McKenzie defines

strategy is not the way that strategy often is understood in many organizations.

For example, one of my clients, in a high tech space in Silicon Valley,

felt that the word strategy meant budget and business and

a detailed budgeting plan over three years.

That's what strategy meant in that context.

In other places it means an over arching multi-year view that includes

the aspiration and the vision, and in other places it means yet something else.

So try and understand in your own mind in the context you're headed in, what does

strategy mean to the person that you are talking to because it's not the same,

it's not defined in the same way by everybody.

That was a interesting insight for

me is that it's a loaded word, that's the first thing.

The second thing I would say is that you should talk to other people,

other people that have been in this position.

So when I would, when I was leading the strategy practice at McKenzie we would run

these chief strategy officer roundtables and often times the attendees would be new

chief strategy officers new into their role.

And one of the very helpful things for them would always be to talk to other

people that are in a similar position and to build a network.

And to understand how others are approaching the process,

approaching the problem, the different frameworks that they are using.

There's something that can be learned from other people.

And there's a lot of innovation happening all the time in terms of different

lenses that you can put on strategy.

Third, I would say that strategy

is an area where you can make a career.

But you don't have to think about it as a lifelong career.

It can be something that you do analytically for a while.

You can go off to the line and then come back as a senior leader.

Because the ultimate strategist in most corporations ends up being

the chief executive or the president or

whatever the title is that they use in that organization.

For example, at University of Virgina, I definitely have to think as the Dean

about the strategy of the school, and at the university level,

Terry Sullivan needs to think about what the strategy of the university is.

But that's to say that there are many levels in

an organization that strategy takes place, it's not just in the strategy department.

And you need to think about in which context

you would like to be thinking about strategy.

Often in the strategy department, it can be a fairly process driven and

spreadsheet driven when you're younger in your career, and later in your career it's

quite different, it feels quite different, what being in strategy is.

So, make sure that you understand

what it means in terms of the job that you might be thinking about.

What would you actually be doing?

I would advise you to have that dialog,

because it may not be what you think it is.

It may not be quite as sexy or exciting as you imagine it to be.

Or on the other hand it might be exactly your dream come true.

But make sure that you know what it is that you're getting yourself into.

That would be my last bit of advice and

to just remember that this is a moving target.

Strategy is something that is an ongoing process, it's a journey as

opposed to a problem that you've solved, you submit the answer and you're done.

So many variables are moving all of the time that this strategy

is actually an ongoing process that you need to run.

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