The Key Players in Setting Strategy
A plan is only as strong as the people who build and own it. Here is who belongs in the room when strategy is set — and what happens when the wrong person stays out.
Who sets the strategy
Who belongs in the room
The first question in strategic planning is not "what is our plan?" It is "who should be here to build it?" Get the room wrong and the finest process in the world produces a document nobody acts on.
The rule is straightforward: everyone who will be responsible for implementing the strategy should take part in creating it — and the ultimate decision-maker must be present from the first minute to the last. Below are the three roles every serious planning session needs.
The decision-maker
The person who will ultimately own the plan — the CEO, CFO or chairman — must be present the entire time. Only they can commit the time, people and money the strategy will need, and only they can sign off on the result. Their presence is not ceremonial; it is what makes the plan real.
The implementers
Everyone who will carry the plan out — senior executives and department heads — should help shape it. There is a simple rule of human nature at work: the more involved people are in building a plan, the more determined they become to make it succeed.
The outside facilitator
An objective guide who has worked with many companies and has no stake in internal politics. You can no more be your own strategist than a lawyer should represent themselves — a person who acts as his own lawyer has a fool for a client. Even seasoned strategists bring one in.
Two companies, one difference
What the decision-maker's presence decides
The same planning process, run with and without the leader in the room, produces opposite outcomes. Two real cases make the point starkly.
The president who stayed
At an oil company, the president sat through every minute of the planning — contributing, listening, and visibly investing in the outcome. His commitment bound the team together. They left aligned and energised, with a plan they all owned.
Outcome: the firm became one of the largest and most profitable in its field.
The chairman who walked out
At a billion-dollar company, the chairman dismissed the sessions as a waste of time and refused to attend. Without the decision-maker present, the team's enthusiasm drained away like air from a balloon, and no one felt authorised to commit.
Outcome: the company slid back into its old habits and, in time, went bankrupt.
Why involvement matters
Commitment follows involvement
There is a direct relationship between the time people spend discussing and questioning a course of action and their commitment to carrying it out. Involvement is not a courtesy extended to the team — it is the mechanism by which a plan becomes something people will fight for.
This is also why the outside facilitator earns their fee: by drawing everyone into the debate rather than letting the loudest voice decide, they raise the whole room's commitment to whatever is agreed.
Set the conditions
Create the right environment
Good strategic thinking needs room to happen. The quality of the plan rises with the quality of attention you can give it, so protect the conditions deliberately: set aside two to four days of committed, unbroken time, and hold the session in a place apart — ideally offsite, away from the phones and the daily operations that will otherwise pull everyone back into the weeds.
- Two to four days of uninterrupted time
- A place apart — offsite, ideally a resort
- Day-to-day operations and phones set aside
- The decision-maker present start to finish
- An outside facilitator to keep it objective
- Everyone who will implement, in the room