How It Works
How It Works
Overview
Positional Strategy
Expansion
Strategy
Situational Strategy
Strategic
Innovation Overview
Expansion Strategy
Expansion strategy builds competitive positions by identifying and
utilizing opportunities in the environment.
Expansion strategy is necessary because existing positions are constantly
degraded by change.
Expansion strategy is built around a four-step process called the Progress
Cycle. The methods of expansion strategy are both exploratory and
scalable. They are essentially experiments used to tackle small obstacles
and explorations in long campaigns.
Many of the rules of expansion strategy focus on controlling
the costs and risks of the experiments.
One of the fundamental rules of front-line strategy is that we cannot
create opportunities. Opportunities can be created only by the competitive
environment. Opportunities exist as "openings" in the environment that allow you to advance
your position in the direction of your mission. These openings are usually
small, but by taking advantage of the small openings, you eventually
position yourself for the big advances you want. Expansion strategy provides a
set of technical tools that allow you to identify openings that would
normally be overlooked.
You must complete a cycle of four steps to make an expansion or advance. These
steps can be defined as listening, aiming, moving, and claiming. If any step in this
Progress Cycle is missing, no advance is possible. Listening identifies opportunities.
Aiming prioritizes these opportunities, identifying the smallest, easiest,
and least costly moves that take you where you want to go.
Moving requires responding appropriately to the situation.
Claiming
identifies the potential, the boundaries, the ownership, and the methods
for utilizing a new position. Both aiming and moving depend on many of the
more advanced and detailed skills of situational strategy.
The Progress Cycle gains power with speed and repetition. It uses small steps
because they are quick and nearly impossible to oppose. It is a standard
model both for large-scale advances (generally referred to as "campaigns")
and for each incremental step in the campaign. Each step in the Progress Cycle (listen,
aim, move, claim) can be broken down into a number of separate smaller
progress cycles. Properly used, this technique of breaking steps into
parts is especially useful for overcoming obstacles.
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