Socrates & the fox. Clem Sunter
as to how to use our model. Some people like to have a one-off conversation on strategy and then only review it if and when the external environment changes to the point that it has to be reviewed. Obviously, any tactical decisions taken at the meeting, along with their associated actions are regularly monitored. Certainly the scenario gameboard is reviewed at appropriate intervals to keep the team aware of its competitive position and possible changes to the environment. Other teams like to have a strategic conversation once a year before the next round of operational planning and budgeting begins. This is fine as long as it doesn’t become a bureaucratic chore.
On the second question, some companies like to restrict the conversation to their top executive team, while others like to cascade it down through the different business units and service departments. Obviously, the lower one goes, the more restricted the scope of the game becomes. Nevertheless, it is still useful to consider the range of activities inside any production unit/service centre and whether these should be changed to accommodate the needs of other in-house departments, which are its clients. Equally, relationships with ‘supplier’ departments can be examined as well.
One company we worked with first held a strategic conversation amongst its executive team. Then each member of the team facilitated the conversation further with his or her region or department. We were not involved in the second step except as bystanders. Such a process developed the conversation into an important internal communication tool and allowed the conversation to become a feedback mechanism to the executive. The whole company was thereby strategically empowered since all employees and management shared a common understanding of the game and the direction in which the organisation intended to go.
A word or two on the attributes of a good facilitator:
It should always be borne in mind that the correct strategic combination to take a company forward is invariably within the minds and experience of the participants. It is simply the role of the facilitator to help the participants identify it. Therefore a good facilitator coaxes brilliance out of participants, rather than comes up with brilliant ideas himself or herself. Hence, the role of the facilitator is different from the role of a consultant.
The facilitator should not be overly knowledgeable about the nature of the company’s business. It sounds surprising, but there is a good reason for this. In helping the facilitator to familiarise himself or herself with the nature of the company’s business, the participants are often forced to return to basics and examine the game from a fresh perspective – unlike anything they have done for years. Having said that, a facilitator should not go into a session completely ignorant of the game under debate, since valuable time will be wasted.
Those with a knowledge of philosophy will find a resonance in the above two attributes with the founding principles of Socratic dialogue. In the dialogue between Socrates and the fox, each of them played a role as a facilitator in the conversation, just as they did that of participant and listener. The result was a conversation that flowed freely, where preconceived ideas were tested and where the participants felt sufficiently liberated to review their strategy.
The remaining chapters will take you through the ten strategic questions in more detail. A flexible set of sub-questions will be developed and examples provided to illustrate the relevance of these questions. The final chapter is the conclusion of our strategic conversation with you and a tribute to Pierre Wack.
But before you take the next step, we think it’s necessary that you understand the impact it might have: our experience has shown that once people have been introduced to this methodology, the quality of their enquiry and the level of thinking about their future are permanently elevated to a new level. This will have an overall beneficial effect on your company’s level of strategic skills, thereby reducing (or removing) the reliance on the opinions of external consultants and the regular transfusions of wisdom they try to inject into your corporate bloodstream. With our questions, we extract the innate wisdom residing in the minds of the executives around the table. We all learn at the same time – like Socrates did in his dialogues with his students, mutually exploring issues and mutually resolving them in the give-and-take of debate.
Furthermore, we give the executive team the ‘quality of sight’. In today’s age, where perception is often regarded as reality and spin merchants abound to provide convincing and sometimes contagious perceptions, seeing through the veil – or the ‘mask of appearances’ as Socrates described it – is vital to success. Whether you are looking at yourself or the world around you, the hype has to be filtered out to make good decisions about the future. You need X-ray vision!
Some comments made as a result of our sessions are:
It was a turning-point because we used the positive scenario derived from the conversation to establish a new set of values and practices throughout the organisation – all the way down to grassroots level.
CEO, BANKING GROUP
Normally I start a meeting by asking what the takeaways are likely to be. I note that, instead of answers, the takeaway will be some questions on strategy to keep me awake at night. I guess that’s what Socrates had in mind.
CEO, NATIONAL BAKERY CHAIN
As a small business, we are too busy doing business to take time out to think about the future. Nor can we afford to have a full-time strategic planner. So the conversation was an ideal way to take stock of our game briefly and passionately. Did you notice there wasn’t a single interruption from a mobile phone? That has to be a first!
CEO, ATM SERVICE PROVIDER
We are all fierce individualists in our family. For the first time, we’ve had a conversation about the business which has brought us together as a team. No doubt in a few weeks time we’ll be going our separate ways again, but at least we’ll have the minutes of this meeting as proof of a fleeting moment of unity.
CHAIRMAN, FAMILY FOOTWEAR BUSINESS
I’m looking at my watch. You said five hours for the conversation and we’ve done it. Unbelievable!
CEO, MINING CONTRACTOR
I like the game analogy because it will give us a better way to process information in the future. If there’s a new player, a new rule of the game or the emergence of a new market scenario, we will be able to adjust faster than our competitors. That’s the name of the game.
DIRECTOR, ASSET-MANAGEMENT COMPANY
What is nice about your model is that it doesn’t get in the way of discussing the business. It’s invisible because it’s so logical. I much prefer it to those methods with cheesy names where you spend half the time figuring out your next step.
CHAIRMAN, TIMBER COMPANY
I came in feeling paper withdrawal symptoms, but you’ve cured me of the habit. In future, I shall consign all thick strategy documents to File 13. I hope it doesn’t get me into hot water!
EXECUTIVE, MUNICIPAL WATER BOARD
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