Good Strategy Bad Strategy

Richard Rumelt is a strategy researcher and professor at UCLA Anderson School of Management. One of his contributions is a diagnostic framework for good strategy: it starts with an honest diagnosis of the challenge, defines a guiding policy for dealing with it, and specifies a set of coherent actions that carry out the policy. Most of what passes for strategy, Rumelt argues, is just goal-setting or wishful thinking dressed up in strategic language.

We use Rumelt’s kernel regularly when helping organizations frame change strategies. The diagnosis forces teams to name the real obstacle instead of jumping to solutions. The guiding policy acts as a constraint that focuses effort. And coherent actions ensure that what people actually do connects back to the policy rather than scattering energy across disconnected initiatives. This maps directly into iterative strategy development, where each cycle refines the diagnosis as new information emerges.

Resources

• Richard Rumelt, “Good Strategy Bad Strategy: The Difference and Why It Matters” (Crown Business, 2011)
• Iterative Strategy Development — how we apply Rumelt’s model in iterative cycles
• Change Vision & Strategy — workshop where this framework is taught