Book of the Month – October 2024

In The Six Disciplines of Strategic Thinking: Leading Your Organization into the Future, Michael D. Watkins presents an actionable framework to help aspiring leaders learn to think strategically, a set of skills more necessary than ever in a world of constant change. And, I would add, a set of skills that are essential for modern enterprise architects.

Well-written and quite an easy read, the book is based on solid research findings. Watkins is a Professor of Leadership and Organizational Change at IMD (International Institute for Management Development) in Switzerland.

In the book, Watkins explores six mental disciplines that constitute strategic thinking. These disciplines allow us to recognize emerging challenges and opportunities, prioritize what really matters and mobilize our organizations to respond proactively.

The first three disciplines are the foundation of our ability to recognize and prioritize the challenges and opportunities facing our organizations:

• Discipline 1: Pattern recognition – Our ability to observe complex, uncertain, volatile and ambiguous (CUVA) business scenarios, rapidly figure out what is and isn’t essential, and identify critical threats and opportunities.
• Discipline 2: Systems analysis – Our ability to mentally model complex situations as systems and leverage those models to recognize patterns, make predictions and develop promising strategies.
• Discipline 3: Mental agility – Our ability to explore business challenges using different levels of analysis, and anticipate the actions and reactions of other stakeholders as they pursue their own goals.

The other three disciplines enhance our ability to mobilize your organization to deal with challenges and opportunities effectively:

• Discipline 4: Structured problem-solving – Our ability to direct your organization to frame problems, develop creative solutions and make tough choices in the most effective ways.
• Discipline 5: Visioning – Our ability to imagine potential futures that are ambitious and achievable and energize your organization to realize them.
• Discipline 6: Political savvy – Our understanding of how influence works in organizations and ability to leverage those insights to build alliances with key stakeholders.

For each of the six disciplines, the book explores – with a chapter for each discipline – what they are and how we can develop them. At the end of the book, Watkins distils this advice in an “exercise programme” for becoming a stronger strategic thinker.

Watkins gives an example of how we can develop our visioning ability in what he calls the architect’s exercise. In this exercise, every time you enter a new home or office you must take a few minutes to think about how you would change the space to make it a more attractive place to live or work. If you are a true architect, you will always do such exercises, whether it is when working with business processes, information systems, or any rules-based system at all: we architects will always envision a better and smarter way to get the job done.

The book is available for purchase on Amazon and other bookstores.