Changing Minds: Why Strategy Change Requires More Than a PowerPoint
To change strategy, you must first change minds.
But changing minds is hard – especially in organizations with deep roots and strong beliefs about who we are and what our customers want. So how do we actually shift collective thinking?
Real strategic change doesn’t begin with a new plan; it begins with a new way of thinking. Our actions and decisions are guided by how we make sense of the world. If we want to steer our organizations differently, first we must rethink how we understand what’s happening around us.
From Familiar Thinking to Strategic Breakthroughs
Strategy is about how people understand the world around them, how they interpret events, decisions, and behaviours. We often rely on familiar ways of thinking that help us make sense of what’s happening. These can be powerful, guiding beliefs like “We’re a product-driven company,” or “Our customers value technical superiority.”
But these ways of thinking don't change because someone tells us to update them. They don’t change when we look at the latest market share graph. They change when something confronts us. Something that shakes our assumptions and makes our old ways feel suddenly incomplete.
This is where sensebreaking comes in. It’s about creating experiences that challenge our ways of thinking. Not through confrontation or by force, but through carefully designed strategy processes that make space for reflection, dissent, and discovery.
Listen Hard Enough, and Your Customers Will Break the Frame for You
In our experience, nothing reshapes beliefs like direct customer insight. When we hear customers talk about their struggles, needs, and desires – often in ways that contradict internal assumptions – it’s hard to ignore.
We’ve seen teams rethink entire offerings after realizing that the problem they were solving wasn’t the one the customer actually had. That moment of clarity? That’s sensebreaking in action.
Making New Sense – Together
Of course, breaking old frames isn’t enough. Organizations need to rebuild shared understanding. That’s why sensebreaking must be followed by sensemaking – crafting a new narrative and anchoring it through decisions that align with this fresh view of our customers.
This is where Open Strategy shines: involving broader voices, exposing assumptions, and enabling collective meaning-making. By doing so, it helps organizations minimize the risks of acting on outdated or ungrounded assumptions, ensures stronger alignment for implementation, and creates the foundation for bolder, more confident strategic shifts.
Changing Minds Is the New Strategic Skill
For organizations facing fast-changing environments, mastering the cycle of sensebreaking and sensemaking is not a luxury – it’s a survival skill. Strategic renewal begins with shifting how people think. And that starts not with better data, but with better conversations – ones that challenge, involve, and ultimately, transform.
Intrigued and want to learn more? Get in touch!