How to Use AI for Strategic Planning

With the right prompt, gen AI can help you spot opportunities you might have missed.

Good Morning!

Here are today’s highlights:            

• What’s the best way to find outside sales people?

• The SBA is inviting more online lenders into its programs.

• The federal government is trying to raise the percentage of businesses that offer 401(k) retirement plans.

• A court ruling has effectively shut down a grant program for Black women entrepreneurs.

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE

The Harvard Business Review says interest at smaller companies in using AI to help with strategic planning is building: “The idea of applying gen AI to strategic planning is mouthwatering. One manager recently exclaimed that he couldn’t wait for the time when ‘AI can help identify opportunities that don’t exist yet!’ But is there a chance we’re overestimating gen AI’s capabilities? How do we identify the areas, if any, where gen AI can boost strategic planning? Are all gen AI tools the same, or are some of them more capable in certain scenarios? To answer these questions, we detail two business cases involving activities central to strategic planning. (Note: The names have been changed.)”

• “Keith wants to tap into a viewpoint outside agricultural science to produce a fresh perspective. To do this, he could replace several of his executives with others from outside his industry. However, this is hardly practical. An alternative is to employ gen AI. We assisted him with the following prompt:”

• “‘We’re a commercial agricultural research organization. With 120 staff, we are the dominant player in our field of independent contractors. Our clients engage us to conduct a wide range of field trials of cereals, vegetables and fruit. What are the key strategic issues we’re likely to face in the future?’”

• “The gen AI tool didn’t pick up two items on Keith’s team’s list. These were ‘branch number and location’ and ‘profitability.’ Branch location is a very specific issue to Trident and gen AI can hardly be expected to know about that. Not mentioning ‘profitability’ is, we think, a big miss. Also, while gen AI picked ‘competition’ as one of its nine issues it didn’t mention the critical issue of ‘product pricing.’”

• “On the positive side, gen AI presented four important areas that Keith’s team missed: ‘technological advancements,’ ‘regulatory changes,’ ‘client demand and expectations,’ and ‘funding and investment.’ All of these are pertinent to Trident’s business strategy. So, on Keith’s first question (can AI provide a non-agricultural perspective?), we decided that gen AI had succeeded. It helped Keith’s team with divergent thinking, a key skill in any successful transformative team.” READ MORE