About strategy.............................

      Unfortunately, good strategy is the exception, not the rule.  And the problem is growing.  More and more organizational leaders say they have a strategy, but they do not.  Instead, they espouse what I call bad strategy.  Bad strategy tends to skip over pesky details such as problems.  It ignores the power of choice and focus, trying instead to accommodate a multitude of conflicting demands and interests.  Like a quarterback whose only advice to teammates is "Let's win," bad strategy covers up its failure to guide by embracing the language of broad goals, ambition, vision, and values.  Each of these elements is, of course, and important part of human life.  But, by themselves, they are not substitutes for the hard work of strategy.

-Richard P. Rumelt, Good Strategy Bad Strategy:  The Difference and Why It Matters