Reading strategies in use

There's so much to see when we watch another person, team or enterprise execute it's strategy. We can see more than those who are caught up in their strategy. With enough experience to recognize patterns, we can see what they're missing, over-emphasizing and downplaying. We can catch the contradictions between what they claim is their strategy and what other strategy is actually reflected in their conduct.

The more practice we get reading others' strategies in use, the better our chances become of detecting our own. We can question the approaches we're taking without stirring up tons of anxiety. Rather than assume we're doing the best we can under our circumstances, we can consider reformulating our strategies. If we can see ourselves through others' eyes, we will notice more of what we usually taken for granted. We will welcome questions like the following to get a good read on our own strategies in use:

1. What are we relying upon as contributing factors to our success and how reliable are these supports?
2. What are we thinking the customers (users, clients, etc.)  will value, buy into and appreciate enough to tell others?
3. How close is our thinking about perceived value with those who's thinking we're counting on to appreciate our strategy?
4. How different is our strategy from those we're getting compared to in the selection process by potential customers?
5. How difficult are those differences between strategies to understand, accept, find uses for and tell others about?
6. How obvious are our strategies to others who are judging our determination, insight, innovation and concern with others' interests?
7. How subtle are our intentions to rivals who could want to copy our innovations, imitate our strategies or match our offers?

These are difficult questions to answer when we're caught up in doing the best we can with what we've got. We don't want to go there and think about strategic alternatives. That's why it takes practice reading others strategies. It becomes a routine we can execute with little anxiety. It becomes an outlook we accept as useful for becoming more successful. Then it becomes something we can do for ourselves too, like it's no big deal.