Business strategy

Business strategy requires three aspects

• Planning backwards from the company’s ideal state in 10 years when formulating long, medium, and short-term strategies
• Taking of a zero-based approach, disregarding the company’s past experiences and existing strategies in place
• Thoroughly implementing the strategies.

In particular, mid-term business plans that most Japanese companies formulate must be carefully considered. There are many examples where mid-term plans do not reflect company mission, get shifted way too often before full implementation, or, on the other hand, are not flexible enough to allow necessary evolution. The most troublesome is when companies pursue appealing strategies and financial plans, resulting in excessive resources being allocated to internal discussions and meetings that push back implementation.

We believe that after formulating a solid core strategy, “deprioritizing” the formulation of details to focus on implementation while making revisions as the company goes through trial and error, will shape it into a “meaningful strategy” that can withstand a highly uncertain environment.