Checklist: Make Time for Developing Strategy

1. Do you spend 15 minutes or more a week listening to music, podcasts, or audiobooks?

2. Do you often listen to music in a chauffeur-driven car, in a metro, bus, or at the gym?

3. Do you spend 15 minutes or more a week on social media platforms, say on Instagram, YouTube, FaceBook, Twitter, Pinterest, etc?

4. Do you spend an hour or more on OTT platforms every week?

5. Is there at least one 15-minute time span every day where you can regularly turn all the above noise off in order to think about big picture strategy?

6. Is there a time during your workweek that is least busy, say a Friday evening or Wednesday afternoon (Identify and note down)?

7. Is it possible for you to run a two-week experiment where you block out one hour every week in your calendar for strategic thinking? (Try it, and if you like the outcomes, jot those down and make it a habit.)

8. Can you think of the names of your coworkers, friends, or peers interested in improving their strategic thinking? (Identify and note down their names)

9. Are you comfortable contacting your coworkers, friends, or peers and raising the prospect of trading ideas/ becoming your accountability partners? (Jot down their response)

10. Have you blocked one hour per week in your calendar, yet, for making strategic thinking an ongoing practice?

• If you checked any 9 or more then you have both the drive and bandwidth of time. You are on the right track! Don’t stuck yourself anywhere. Go ahead and have breakthrough ideas!

• If you checked any 7 or 8 then you are fairly sorted with bandwidth of time and motivation to develop mindset for strategic thinking. You just have to utilize it all, push your efforts a bit more to tread the steps. Good going!

• If you checked from 1 to 6 then you are sorted with time but are struggling with the motivation to develop mindset for strategic thinking. Identify what’s stopping you and what can trigger you. Ace the battle against challenge. Way to go!

• If you checked from 3 to 8 or 4 to 9 or 2 to 7 then you are slightly struggling either with the bandwidth of time or the drive to develop mindset for strategic thinking. Identify the imbalance and what’s contributing to it and remediate it. You can do it!

• If you checked from 5 to 10 then you are rushing in life. Take it easy. Time to focus on work-life balance first. Once that is sorted, you will find it easy to take out time for your other important aspects of work or outside of work. All the best!