Regular viewers of The Apprentice will be familiar with the word strategy, as the contestants use it liberally. Unfortunately, overuse of the word strategy can often be a camouflage to mask a lack of real knowledge about what strategy is or how it can be useful in a business context. Online business course experts Tricres, also like to keep things simple with their Habits and Housekeeping strategy model.

To put it in simple terms, a strategy is an action plan. There are three words in that definition that will make the difference between a successful strategy and an unsuccessful one. Your strategies must be ‘high level’. Do not be tempted to write War and Peace. Keep the strategies to around one to two sides of paper and make sure that whoever you share them with, understands them. No fancy nancy language which can lead to confusion.

You should focus on the word ‘action’ here. Many business owners write beautiful strategies and then allow them to gather dust on their desk or in their laptop. Once you’ve decided on your overall business strategy, then you need to go ahead and take action. Navel gazing won’t grow your business.

Lastly, once you have your strategy, you need to remember that it can be changed. If the conditions change, your business changes or something isn’t working with your strategy, for goodness sake, change it. Set a review date in every strategy you write for your business so you can keep on track.

So, why write a strategy in the first place? Firstly, you can’t hold all the information in your own head about your business when you have other people working with you. It’s not good for you or them. Your business has more value if other people know where its’s going, plus you can delegate the accountability and responsibility for the delivery of a strategy, which frees you up to get on with that task of working on your business. In a larger business, you’ll be delegating the responsibility for writing as well as delivering the various strategies such as sales, marketing, talent pipeline etc.In addition, completing your Habits and Housekeeping strategies gives your business the equivalent of a log book, similar to having a log book for your car. It means your business can be run without you at the helm 24/7 and has more value because it doesn’t need you to be there all the time to be successful.

Finally, how can you achieve your goals if you don’t know how to reach them? Having well thought through strategies means you can plan where you’re heading and know when you go off course. It’s like the auto pilot on an aeroplane – set the course and when you hit turbulence, it’s so much easier to get back on track.