E7 [On Strategy]: The Strategy Loop: Find Where You’re Stuck, Then Move
Leaders don’t stall because they lack ideas. We stall because the loop breaks. We set strategy, then the week fills up, priorities blur, decisions drift, and we don’t circle back to what we learned. In mission-driven work—schools, nonprofits, foundations, startups—the cost is energy and trust.
A simple fix is a loop you can run in two weeks: Strategy → Prioritization → Decisions → Review → (back to) Strategy. Your job is to find where you’re stuck in that loop and make one small move.
Strategy (what matters now).
Name three outcomes for this year—one for the people you serve, one for your team, one for financial health. Add guardrails: mission, budget, timeline, and well-being. If you can’t say these out loud, you’ll drown in good ideas.
Prioritization (order and tradeoffs).
Sort work into Must / Should / Could, then say one Stop-Doing out loud for 30 days. Every “yes” needs a “no” to buy back attention.
Decisions (ownership and pace).
End meetings with a 60-second close: name the owner, the guardrails, a two-week pilot, what success looks like, and a decision date. No consensus? Disagree & commit for one sprint and let the pilot decide.
Review (learn fast, adjust).
In two weeks, ask: What happened? What did we learn? What changes now (keep/stop/start)? Update the one-page strategy and run the loop again.
This is problem-finding before problem-solving without getting stuck in analysis. For a school, that might be piloting a single advisory routine in one grade and checking student referrals and feedback after two weeks. For a nonprofit, it might be a 10-day donor stewardship sprint (20 calls) and measuring meetings booked. Small proofs beat big promises.
If you adopt only one habit, adopt the close: Owner, guardrails, two-week pilot, success measure, decision date. It restores clarity, discipline, and accountability in under a minute—and it pulls the loop forward.
Run the loop. Find the stuck. Make one move.
Note: A self-assessment checklist for leadership teams is included below for paid subscribers.
Self-Assessment for Leadership Teams: Where’s Your Loop Stuck? (Yes/No)
Strategy
We can name three yearly outcomes (people served, team, financial health) without looking.
Our guardrails are explicit: mission, budget ($___), timeline (by ___), and well-being.
Prioritization
We have a visible Must / Should / Could list.
We’ve named one Stop-Doing for the next 30 days.
Decisions
Every meeting ends with a named owner, a two-week pilot, a success measure, and a decision date.
When we disagree, we disagree & commit for one sprint.
Review
We hold a 15-minute review every two weeks (what happened, what we learned, what changes).
We update a one-page strategy after each review.
If you answered “No” anywhere: start there. Make that one move today, then run the loop for two weeks.