Open Strategy

How smart companies are opening up strategic initiatives to involve front-line employees, experts, suppliers, customers, entrepreneurs, and even competitors. Why are some of the worlds most successful companies able to stay ahead of disruption, adopting and implementing innovative strategies, while others struggle? Its not because they hire a new CEO or expensive consultants but rather because these pioneering companies have adopted a new way of strategizing. Instead of keeping strategic deliberations within the C-Suite, they open up strategic initiatives to a diverse group of stakeholdersfront-line employees, experts, suppliers, customers, entrepreneurs, and even competitors. Open Strategy presents a new philosophy, key tools, step-by-step advice, and fascinating case studiesfrom companies that range from Barclays to Adidasto guide business leaders in this groundbreaking approach to strategy. The authorsbusiness-strategy experts from both academia and management consultingintroduce tools for each of the three stages of strategy-making: idea generation, plan formulation, and implementation. These are digital tools (including strategy contests), which allow the widest participation; hybrid digital/in-person tools (including a nightmare competitor challenge); a workshop tool that gamifies the business model development process; and tools that help companies implement and sustain open strategy efforts. Open strategy has an astonishing track record: a survey of 200 business leaders shows that although open-strategy techniques were deployed for only 30 percent of their initiatives, those same initiatives generated 50 percent of their revenues and profits. This book offers a roadmap for this kind of success.