Managers know there are many different tools available to help understand industries, markets, competitors, people and processes. There are tools to help understand how these are interacting with each other. But knowing more about which tools are available, and which tool to use when is what sets

• Tools with which you organization is comfortable
  
• Tools that extend your strategic skill and insight and
  
• Tools that attack the main issues or challenges you face

And we will be upfront in what analytical tool, what discussion technique or decision model we are suggesting and why.
 
A couple of examples will illustrate the point well.

Perhaps you are a B2B services organization with a lot of face to face client contact. You service a wide geography and provide a narrow band of specialized services to the industry you serve. Such firms are likely (though

reserves its opinion until we meet) to favor a learning or emergent approach to strategy development. They frequently struggle to plan or unify branding or messages, have trouble defining what they do, need to address what value is best delivered centrally and what should be delivered at brand or consultant level and often have a low level of insight into competitive advantage. Positioning, Alignment and Mapping analysis and tools will probably help.

Alternatively, you may be a consumer goods manufacturer with a myriad of customers and an intensifying requirement to be globally competitive both in reach and scale. Such firms are likely (though

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