Established model
Rumelt’s kernel of good strategy
Richard P. Rumelt · 2011
Also known as Diagnosis, guiding policy, coherent action
A strategy is a diagnosis, a guiding policy and a set of coherent actions — and anything without all three is a wish list.
Its place in the frameworkGoal Core›Strategic goals
What it does
The diagnosis names what is actually in the way. The guiding policy is the approach chosen to deal with it. The actions are coordinated steps that follow from it and support each other. The argument is that most documents called strategy contain only ambitions, and that the absence of a diagnosis is what makes them impossible to argue with.
- Reach for it when
- As a test on any strategic goal: can you state the obstacle it answers, and does anything follow from it that rules something else out?
- Where it stops
- It is a standard for what a strategy must contain, not a method for finding one. It can tell you that yours is empty without telling you what to put in it.
Richard P. Rumelt, Good Strategy / Bad Strategy, Crown Business, 2011.
Why it sits at Strategic goals
The few goals that decide direction. A strategic goal is not simply a large goal — it is one that answers a diagnosed problem and commits the organisation to some paths at the cost of others.
A model is only useful when you reach for it at the right moment. This one answers a question that arises here — so it is filed here, and nowhere else. These are the working areas it serves:
- DiagnosisRumelt, Good Strategy / Bad Strategy (2011): diagnosis, guiding policy and coherent action as the kernel of any real strategy.
- Strategic themesKaplan & Norton’s strategy maps, where themes connect objectives across perspectives into a causal chain.
- Trade-offsPorter, What Is Strategy? (1996): the essence of strategy as choosing what not to do, and the role of trade-offs in making a position defensible.
- Horizon and measuresBalanced Scorecard practice on tying each strategic objective to a small number of outcome measures.
What it touches elsewhere
Nothing in a business is decided on its own. A conclusion reached with this model at Strategic goals lands in these other cores, whether or not anyone follows it there.
- Vision CoreStrategic goals should be readable as steps towards the stated vision.
- Market CoreDiagnosis usually begins here — with competitors, audience and opportunity.
- Brand CorePositioning is a strategic choice and belongs among these goals, not after them.
- Data CoreWhere the outcome measures are defined, collected and reported.
Filed at the same place
These answer questions that arise at Strategic goals too. Where they disagree with this one, the disagreement is the useful part.
- The Ansoff MatrixFour directions growth can come from, ordered by how much is unfamiliar in each.
- Porter’s generic strategiesThere are three ways to win a market, and trying to do more than one at a time is how companies end up winning none.
Elsewhere in Goal Core
These are other people’s models, named here so you can go to the source and use them properly. The Omnigoal is not affiliated with their authors and is not endorsed by them; nothing of theirs is reproduced here — no canvas, no diagram, no wording. Each is described in our own words, with the originator credited, because the framework is a place to put thinking, not a replacement for the people who did it. Model names and trademarks belong to their respective owners and are used here only to refer to the work itself.
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