70% of CEOs say that their strategy is clear, but only 10% of their teams agree.
That gap? That’s where misalignment lives. It’s where priorities get lost and momentum dies.
This lack of strategic clarity is one of the biggest blind spots I see among even the smartest, most driven leaders.
Because here’s the thing. You can have the most incredible vision in the world, or the most high-value product or service to offer. But without a clear and well-executed strategic plan, you’ll struggle to lead your business to success.
In my work with CEOs and founders, I see two common mistakes when it comes to strategic planning:
- They overcomplicate the process with unnecessary jargon, never-ending slide decks, and a confusing tangle of frameworks
- They avoid it altogether, running their business purely on instinct and firefighting.
The outcome is the same in both cases: zero clarity, zero alignment, and zero progress.
But it doesn’t have to be that way.
In this post, I’ll show you how top-performing CEOs approach strategic planning, and how you can start applying those same tools and techniques for success.
What Is Strategic Planning?
Think of your business like a road trip.
You know where you want to end up (say, California). That’s your vision.
You also know why you want to do the road trip (e.g. to spend quality time with your loved ones and have an adventure). That’s your mission.
Now you need to figure out the best way to get there. That’s your strategy.
Your strategy is the “how”: how you will execute your vision and your mission. It’s a plan of action for how you’ll reach your goals, factoring in the realities of the market and the environment in which you operate.
And strategy doesn’t happen by accident. It’s the result of careful strategic planning.
Strategic planning is the dedicated (and ongoing) process of mapping out your route. It defines the decisions, priorities, and actions that will move you closer to your vision each day.
It typically involves:
- Assessing where you’re at right now: understanding your current performance, market position, strengths, and weaknesses
- Clarifying your vision and mission: making sure your long-term direction and purpose are clearly defined and shared across the leadership team
- Defining strategic priorities: deciding what matters most over the next 12–36 months, and where your business will focus its efforts
- Identifying key initiatives and allocating resources: outlining the major actions, capabilities, and investments required to execute your strategy
- Establishing metrics and accountability: setting measurable goals, identifying owners, and creating a rhythm for review and adjustment.
And bear in mind that strategic planning isn’t a one-off exercise. It’s a continuous process that needs to be revisited and adapted regularly as your business evolves and market conditions shift.
Why Strategic Planning Is Non-Negotiable
Without a clear strategy, even the most talented teams end up scattered. You waste time on the wrong projects. You say yes to too much. Your energy, focus, and resources are diluted. Inevitably, momentum stalls.
I see this all the time: leaders juggling multiple priorities, reacting to the loudest problems, and making decisions on the fly.
It might work for a while (especially in the early days) but it’s not sustainable.
Over time, teams pull in different directions. Key decisions take longer than necessary, and progress becomes harder to measure. You end up with misalignment at every level of the business.
That’s why strategic planning is critical. It gives you a clear roadmap to follow; a structure for making intentional decisions about where to focus, what to prioritize, and how to allocate your resources.
It’s the difference between setting off on your road trip with half a tank of fuel and hoping for the best, versus having a well-mapped route, knowing where the gas stations are, and having a plan for what to do if traffic conditions change.
Strategic planning is how you align your actions with your goals to get results.
So how do the top CEOs do it? Let’s take a look.
How Top CEOs Do Strategic Planning (an Actionable Guide You Can Follow)
At the start of this post, I shared where strategic planning most commonly goes wrong. People tend to either overcomplicate it, or to underestimate it and not give it the attention it deserves.
Now I’m going to share what top CEOs do differently, together with key learnings and action points you can implement directly.
So here’s how top CEOs do strategic planning, and how you can do it too.
1. They Keep It Simple
The more complex your strategy, the harder it is to execute. The most effective strategies can be explained in just one sentence.
I like to use the cocktail napkin as a benchmark: if you wrote your strategy down, could it comfortably fit on a cocktail napkin?
Your strategy should be both concise and clear. Use simple, plain language and focus on just 1-3 priorities.
What To Do: Define what success looks like over the next 12-36 months in clear, actionable terms, then pressure test it. Can your team explain it without looking at a slide?
Example: Let’s say you’re running a SaaS company preparing for growth. Your strategy might look something like: “Expand into two new European markets and increase enterprise revenue by 30% in 18 months.”
It’s clear, it’s actionable, and it’s measurable. That’s all you need.
2. They Make Trade-Offs
Great strategy isn’t about doing more. Often, it’s about choosing what not to do; saying no and making trade-offs to keep your focus in the right place.
Effective CEOs know they can’t chase every opportunity or solve every problem at once. So they figure out where they can make the most impact — and that’s where they commit their time and resources.
What To Do: Look at your current initiatives. What’s directly tied to your strategic priorities and what’s a distraction? Is your team clear and focused in their work, or are they slowed down by too many priorities?
Trim away the unnecessary work and channel your resources where they can make the most impact.
Example: You’ve set seven company-wide goals for the next quarter. You want to do everything: launch a new product, expand into a new region, improve internal processes, and rebrand. But progress is slow across the board.
So you decide to cut the list down to just two main priorities: shipping the new product and onboarding five key enterprise clients. Suddenly, the team has clarity and momentum picks up.
3. They Strategize Based on Their Strengths
The best strategies are rooted in self-awareness.
Top CEOs double down on what makes their business different, not what the competition is doing. They understand their strengths, eliminate offerings that aren’t aligned, and focus on creating defensibility around their core advantage.
They also stay close to their customers. They understand who they’re serving and what actually creates value for those people, as well as what pain-points they can solve. That’s ultimately what keeps people coming back.
What To Do: Get really clear on your value. What do you deliver that your customers can’t get anywhere else? That’s your edge, and your strategy should revolve around it.
Use a SWOT analysis to clarify where your strengths lie, and eliminate offerings and activities that aren’t aligned with your core competencies.
Example: You run an e-commerce business with a broad product range: desks, chairs, lighting, and accessories. However, after reviewing your data, you realize 80% of revenue comes from ergonomic chairs.
Instead of trying to grow every category equally, you build your strategy around your edge. You streamline your product line, invest in product development for chairs, and position your brand as the go-to for ergonomic seating.
You’re playing to your strengths and making it harder for anyone else to compete.
4. They Make Progress Measurable
A strategy is only useful if you can track whether it’s working.
As part of their strategic planning efforts, top CEOs don’t just set goals. They define what success looks like and how it will be measured. This gives the team something concrete to work towards, and helps you spot problems early before they become serious blockers.
So strategic planning is also about defining the right metrics.
That will vary depending on your business model and your goals, but metrics should link directly to your strategic priorities. That might mean setting quarterly OKRs, tracking core KPIs, or comparing actual financial performance against forecasted targets.
What matters is that you’re consistently measuring progress and using that insight to make better decisions.
What To Do: Choose a small set of metrics that directly reflect your strategic goals. Assign clear owners to each one, and review them regularly (ideally weekly or monthly). Build check-ins into your operational rhythm, and use these check-ins not just to report on progress, but also to troubleshoot issues and make adjustments in real-time.
Example: Your goal is to grow your customer base. To make that meaningful and measurable, you track three specific metrics: weekly signups, activation rate, and churn.
Each domain has a clear owner and is reviewed in your Monday team meeting. When churn suddenly spikes, you spot it early — and quickly launch a fix before it impacts growth.
5. They Continuously Review and Adapt
Even the clearest, most well-defined strategy won’t stay relevant forever, and strategic planning is not a one-time exercise.
Top CEOs make a habit of revisiting and refining their plans regularly — not necessarily because something’s gone wrong, but because conditions and priorities change over time.
Your strategic planning should stay flexible and adaptable. That might mean adjusting timelines, reallocating resources, or revisiting priorities based on new data. The process of regularly checking in and staying close to the strategy helps keep everyone focused and moving in the right direction.
What To Do: Build a regular review cadence into your strategic planning process. Weekly dashboards, monthly check-ins, and quarterly strategic reviews are a good starting point.
And most importantly: make these sessions meaningful. Rather than viewing them as just another item on the calendar, treat them as an opportunity to see what’s working and make timely adjustments.
Example: You’re six months into a 12-month plan focused on expanding into new markets, but a supply chain issue pushes costs up unexpectedly.
Instead of sticking rigidly to the plan, you adjust: pause the expansion, focus on margins, and reallocate resources to improve operational efficiency.
Because you’ve built in regular reviews, this pivot feels like part of the process, not a setback.
So that’s how top CEOs approach strategic planning. Next, I’m going to share some proven tools that I use with my coaching clients. You can use these to refine your own strategic planning efforts and get laser-sharp on your focus.
Use These CEO-Proven Tools for Strategic Planning
Wheel of Strategy
The first tool I want to share is my Wheel of Strategy. I’ve developed this tool to simplify the strategic planning process and make sure the right questions are being answered.
The Wheel of Strategy breaks the task of strategic planning down into four essential areas:
- Purpose & Direction
- Market & Advantage
- Goals & Metrics
- Actions & Tactics
Each domain contains five questions. And, as you answer these questions, your strategy will become crystal-clear.
Purpose & Direction
- Why do we exist? Who actually needs us?
- What’s our mission in one clear sentence?
- What do we believe that drives how we operate?
- Where do we want to be in 3 years?
- What would success look like if nothing held us back?
Market & Advantage
- Who is our highest-value customer?
- What pain are they feeling every day?
- What’s changing in our industry? How do we stay ahead?
- Why do people choose us — or not?
- What can we offer that’s hard to copy?
Goals & Metrics
- What are our top 3 priorities right now?
- What does success look like this quarter?
- What’s the one number that matters most today?
- How do we review progress each week?
- What milestone will tell us we’re winning?
Actions & Tactics
- What must we deliver in the next 90 days?
- Who owns each outcome? By when?
- What’s currently blocked? How do we fix it fast?
- What quick wins will build momentum now?
- When and how will we check in and adjust?
Save this framework and use it in your next leadership meeting, quarterly reset, or company offsite — any time you want to get clear on your strategic direction.
The 70-20-10 Prioritization Framework
This next strategic planning tool will help you define your priorities and guide you in where to allocate your resources for maximum impact.
I call this the 70-20-10 approach, and it’s a simple yet effective way to balance focus and innovation within your strategy.
Here’s how it works:
- 70% of your time, budget, and energy should go towards your core business. This means optimizing what already works: refining existing products, increasing efficiency, and solving problems your customers are facing right now.
- 20% should go towards adjacent opportunities — things that are closely related to what you already do, like launching a new feature for an existing customer segment or entering a nearby market.
- 10% is for transformative bets: radical new ideas or concepts that come with high potential risk and reward.
Use the 70-20-10 lens to make intentional choices about where to focus.
If you run a productivity app, for example, you might apply the 70-20-10 framework as follows:
- 70% of your team is focused on improving the core product experience: reducing bugs, improving performance, and responding to user feedback.
- 20% is working on launching a new integration with a popular calendar tool — something your existing customers have been asking for.
- 10% is exploring a completely new AI-based feature that could change how users plan their day. It’s early, but it could become a major differentiator.
With this approach, you’re building for the future while staying grounded in what works today.
The Takeaway: Strategic Planning Is Your Roadmap for Success
Strategic planning is all about creating a system that helps you lead with clarity and build momentum in your business. It keeps you focused on your goals and the daily actions and decisions you need to achieve them.
Here’s a quick recap of how the top CEOs do it — and how you can do it, too:
- Keep your strategy simple, focused, and easy to articulate
- Make intentional trade-offs to avoid spreading your team and resources too thin
- Build your strategy around what you do best — not what everyone else is doing
- Set clear metrics and review them regularly to stay on track
- Treat strategic planning as an ongoing process, not a one-time event
- Use tools like my Wheel of Strategy and the 70-20-10 framework to gain clarity and balance short-term execution with long-term innovation.
Are you ready to lead with clarity and take a more strategic approach to growth? Then I’d love to have you on The CEO Accelerator.
The CEO Accelerator is both a course and a community I’ve built for founders who are scaling fast and want to do so with laser-sharp clarity and focus.
As part of the course, you’ll get access to the same tools and frameworks I use with my 1-1 coaching clients to turn strategy into action and set meaningful priorities. You can learn all about The CEO Accelerator here.
Read also:
- The Secret to Goal Setting Success: What Top CEOs Do Differently
- How to Design a Sales Strategy Plan for Explosive Business Growth [Free Template]
- From KPIs to OKRs: Weekly Operating Rhythms That Fuel Company Growth
FAQ
What is meant by strategic planning?
Strategic planning is the process of deciding where your business is headed and how you’ll get there. It’s like creating an actionable roadmap, and it involves setting clear priorities, making intentional trade-offs, and defining the actions and metrics that will move you closer to your long-term goals.
It’s about setting a direction and creating a practical, flexible system that helps you lead with focus and make better decisions day to day.
What is an example of strategic planning?
Strategic planning involves setting clear goals and outlining the steps to achieve them. For example, a SaaS company might decide to expand into two new markets and increase enterprise revenue by 30% within 18 months. To do this, they focus on targeted sales, product localization, and hiring key staff, tracking progress with quarterly OKRs and revenue milestones to stay on track.
What tools do you need for strategic planning?
Useful strategic planning tools include frameworks like SWOT analysis to assess your strengths and weaknesses, and goal-setting systems such as OKRs or KPIs to measure progress. The 70-20-10 framework helps you balance core business focus with new opportunities and innovation. Other helpful tools include the Wheel of Strategy, plus regular check-ins to keep your team aligned and accountable.
