What prevents well-crafted strategies from being implemented effectively?, the smartest leaders don’t start with strategy—they start with alignment.
Robin Speculand from Bridges Business Consultancy has found that only one out of three transformations in today’s digital world delivers on their promises. They define success as achieving at least 50% of strategic objectives, and only one in eight companies go on to deliver long-term, sustained differentiation. There are several factors that can contribute to failed launches, but one that is rarely considered is whether enough preparation has been made before starting the strategic planning process.
When the managing partners of a top-tier law firm in Asia invited us to support their leadership team ahead of a major strategy day, we knew where to start. It might be a surprising angle, but it’s not always best to start with what you think you want to achieve from the strategy itself. We didn’t begin with vision statements or market forecasts. We began by identifying any points of friction. Not dysfunction, but rather the kind of tension that can become highly productive and fuel sustainable innovation and transformational change when properly understood and managed.
Many professional services firms face competing demands, such as balancing regulatory rigor with client-centric innovation, and managing internal governance while exploring new service models. To navigate this process, we introduced some tools that could help identify gaps and opportunities.
What emerged wasn’t just a simple snapshot of the challenges: it was the first step in designing a strategic blueprint. It revealed where collaboration could thrive, and where misalignment might quietly derail execution. The Pre-Strategy session didn’t replace their strategy day, it supercharged it. By aligning leadership styles, surfacing paradoxes, and building strategic muscle memory, the team was ready to lead with clarity and confidence.
Before Strategy: Why Smart Teams Start with Alignment Rather than Risking Jumping Straight In
In the rush to set bold goals and map out quarterly priorities, many leadership teams overlook a critical phase: the moment before strategy begins.
A Pre-Strategy Workshop should be more than just a warm-up or a team-building exercise. It should be a strategic intervention designed to surface tensions, align perspectives, and build the shared language needed to lead with clarity and cohesion. Especially in regulated, high-stakes environments, skipping this step can mean the difference between a strategy that sticks—and one that stalls.
Even the most experienced teams carry invisible fault lines: competing priorities, divergent leadership styles, and unspoken assumptions about what “success” looks like. When these aren’t surfaced early, they show up later—as misalignment, friction, or strategic drift.
Initial signals that these tensions might need to be addressed might be: “We’re moving fast but losing clarity”, “We’re stuck between wanting to innovate and needing to maintain current systems and structures”, or “We’re aligned in purpose but not energized”.
Common symptoms can include:
- Leadership teams that talk about collaboration but operate in silos
- Strategy sessions that feel productive but lack follow-through
- Innovation initiatives that stall due to control-based resistance
A Pre-Strategy Workshop helps teams pause and recalibrate. It’s not about slowing down—it’s about ensuring everyone is on the same page before accelerating.
What Happens in a Pre-Strategy Workshop?
Pre-Strategy Workshop sessions can be designed to be lean, high-impact, and tailored to the team’s context. They should include:
- Leadership diagnostics to reveal how each person approaches innovation and change
- Paradox mapping to identify tensions that must be navigated—not resolved
- Collaborative canvassing to build strategic pathways through complexity
- Scenario alignment to test assumptions and stress-test priorities before formal planning begins
The result? A team that’s not just aligned on goals, but equipped to lead through ambiguity and paradox.
Ideally, by the end of a strategy session the group will be able to:
- Visualize competing priorities without oversimplifying
- Strategically position themselves for both agility and stability
- Build a shared language for innovation and execution
Why It Matters
In a world of complexity and accelerating change, strategy needs more than vision, it needs alignment. A Pre-Strategy Workshop helps teams build that foundation. It ensures that when the strategy day arrives, leaders aren’t just ready to plan – they’re ready to lead.
Whether you’re facilitating a multi-phase innovation sprint or preparing a board-level strategic review, starting with alignment isn’t a luxury, it’s a leadership imperative.
RECOMMENDED PRE-STRATEGY, STRATEGIC PLANNING & WORKSHOP TOOLS
We recommend it’s best to start by conducting a proactive pre-workshop to achieve pre-strategy alignment. This involves working closely with the client beforehand and drawing from a comprehensive toolkit to identify and understand their diverse demands.
One of the key components we include in our toolkit is a specialized AI prompting guide, which helps to capture the nuanced needs and aspirations of the leaders. In a Pre-Strategy Workshop, we then also draw from the suite of Tirian tools (see below) designed for leadership teams operating in complex, regulated, or innovation-critical environments.
Our recommended Pre-Strategy Workshop planning process:
- Initial Consultation: We begin with an in-depth consultation to understand the participant’s current position and future aspirations. (includes one-on-one interviews and online survey).
- Data Gathering: Using AI prompting and other tools, we collect data on the competing demands and ideas within the leadership team.
- Analysis and Strategy Development: We analyze this data to identify common themes and potential areas of conflict. Based on this analysis, we develop a strategy that balances bold innovation with cautious pragmatism.
- Pre-Workshop Alignment: Before the workshop, we share our findings and proposed strategy with the leadership team to ensure everyone is on the same page. This includes the pre-survey with a report and preparing the iCLi team graph with a report. All of these materials are then uploaded to a unique Collaborator Canvas that can be utilized before, during, and after the workshop.
This proactive approach not only prepares the participants for the workshop but also sets the stage for the successful implementation of the strategy. By aligning the leadership team beforehand, we ensure that the workshop is productive and focused on moving forward together.
Andrew Grant and Dr. Gaia Grant (PhD) are globally recognized experts in innovation leadership, known for their groundbreaking research and bestselling books, including The Innovation Race and Who Killed Creativity?. Through Tirian (& Sydney University Business School), they have helped Fortune 500 companies and global leaders navigate the complexities of change, offering research-backed tools like the Innovation Climate Indicator (iCLi).
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