Leader Roles for Innovation: Strategic Thinking and Planning

In a new global environment, characterized by rapid change, intense information flows and increasing competition because of the reduction of barriers to trade and exchange. Organizations’ leaders face new and hard threats which oblige them to be innovative, it is obvious that innovation has always been at the heart of business, but until now not at the top of the management agenda. Competition turns into a game of who can generate the best and greatest number of ideas with strategic perspective. However many organizations spend most of their time reacting to unexpected changes instead of anticipating and preparing for them. Organizations caught off guard may spend a great deal of time and energy “playing catch up”. They use up their energy coping with immediate problems with little energy left to anticipate and prepare for the next challenges. This vicious cycle locks many organizations into a reactive posture. It does not have to be that way. A sensible alternative is a well tested process called strategic planning which is a step by step process with definite objectives and end products that can be implemented and evaluated. Very simply, it is a process by which we look into the future, paint a picture of that future based on current trends, and influence the forces that will affect us. Strategic Planning is a technical fix that gets at only part of the question of organizational effectiveness and only deals with some of the dilemmas of organizations. In the face of such realities, the notion of strategic thinking emerges to fill the gaps and overcome the limitations that experience with strategic planning has proven to exhibit. This paper presents an integration of leadership roles for innovation by focus on strategic thinking and planning in an effort to make important connections and important distinctions.