Just read a great op-ed piece in the NYT. My business partner Jeff emailed it to me, saying "great article for a 'strategy' post," and indeed it is.
It's by Thomas L. Friedman, of The World Is Flat and Hot, Flat and Crowded fame; it’s about strategy, on a whole variety of levels. The core of the article is his premise that Singapore is much more strategic than the US in how it approaches governing. He believes that it's because they have to be. He quotes a local economist, Tan Kong Yam, contrasting his own country with the US, "We’re like someone living in a hut without any insulation. We feel every change in the wind or the temperature and have to adapt. You Americans are still living in a brick house with central heating and don’t have to be so responsive.”
It's certainly a true statement, but I don't believe it fully explains why the people governing Singapore are thinking more strategically than politicians in the US. I've seen lots of companies skating on the thin, non-insulated edge of change that don't respond strategically at all - in fact, in my experience, those companies are more likely to react out of fear and behave in ways that are short-sighted and ultimately self-destructive.
I got curious - why is it that Singapore, a nation of just under 5,000,000, seems to take such a deeply strategic approach to its own governance? - That is, how is it that they consistently focus on those core directional choices that will best move them toward their hoped-for future?
As I looked into it (man, I love the internet), I discovered that a big part of the answer resides within one man: Lee Kuan Yew. Lee was Singapore’s Prime Minister from 1959 to 1990, and is credited with almost singlehandedly taking Singapore from “a relatively underdeveloped colonial outpost with no natural resources into a first world 'Asian Tiger'.” Lee seems to have been – and is still – a truly strategic leader: he was able to look, clear-eyed, at Singapore’s current state in the 50s when he first entered politics. He immediately began to envision and articulate a better future for his country, and then proceeded to inspire and engage its citizens in moving toward that vision… and has done so for over half a century. (Now of course, there are all kinds of ways in which Singapore is not a model of democracy - but I'm just talking, as Friedman was, about its strategic approach to governance.)
In working with a variety of organizations, large and small, over the years, I’ve come to feel more and more strongly that the ability and willingness of the leader to think and behave strategically over time is the most important factor in that organization’s long-term success.
I’ve just had my belief reinforced.
