Sentient Strategy

No pre-pandemic strategy is effective anymore. None. Not for organizations large or small, for-profit or non-profit, domestic or global. Claims of a "return to normal" or "the new normal" are ridiculous. What we’re facing is really a "new reality," and that reality is the need for agile strategic decisions and pragmatic views of the future. That means that strategy formulation can be reduced to a few days and the view of the future can only be 12–18 months. This is the antithesis of Peter Drucker’s approach to strategy, but his highly effective approach was developed at GM three quarters of a century ago. It’s time to move on.

Alan Weiss has developed an original and completely new approach to strategy which thus far has certified over 100 people globally, delivering this approach to scores of firms of all types in four countries. More than two dozen firms are using this approach.

Sentient Strategy is based on two modern dimensions: awareness of the environment in which the organization exists and has influence, and consciousness of the impact of actions being considered. The old SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats) approaches are currently equivalent to riding down the freeway on a horse. We must drop the hubris that has led us to believe we can see years ahead and anticipate what’s coming. No one predicted the Internet No one predicted the latest pandemic.

It’s time to turn volatility and disruption on their heads and use them as offensive weapons in the marketplace instead of trying to protect ourselves from them. Imagine a strategy that an organization can formulate in just a day or so, revisit easily and frequently, and design a series of shorter-term, viable futures. "Sentient" means "perceptive" and "self-aware." It doesn’t mean "one size fits all" from a cookie-cutter firm’s approach to strategy.

Alan Weiss equips the reader to consider using this approach independently. These are new times—a new reality, a "no normal™"—hence, it’s ridiculous to use old approaches to strategy. There’s a clear reason why Sears didn’t morph into Amazon and why Hertz surrendered its number one spot to Enterprise.

Alan Weiss is one of those rare people who can say he is a consultant, speaker, and author and mean it. His consulting firm, Summit Consulting Group, Inc., has attracted clients such as Merck, Hewlett-Packard, GE, Mercedes-Benz, State Street Corporation, Times Mirror Group, The Federal Reserve, The New York Times Corporation, Toyota, and over 500 other leading organizations.

He has served on the boards of directors of the Trinity Repertory Company, a Tony-Award-winning New England regional theater, Festival Ballet, chaired the Newport International Film Festival, and been president of the board of directors of Festival Ballet Providence. His speaking typically includes 20 keynotes a year at major conferences, and he has been a visiting faculty member at Case Western Reserve University, Boston College, Tufts, St. John’s, the University of Illinois, the Institute of Management Studies, and the University of Georgia Graduate School of Business. He has held an appointment as adjunct professor in the Graduate School of Business at the University of Rhode Island where he taught courses on advanced management and consulting skills to MBA and PhD candidates.

He once held the record for selling out the highest priced workshop (on entrepreneurialism) in the then-21-year history of New York City’s Learning Annex. His Ph.D. is in psychology. He has served on the Board of Governors of Harvard University’s Center for Mental Health and the Media. He is an inductee into the Professional Speaking Hall of Fame® and the concurrent recipient of the National Speakers Association Council of Peers Award of Excellence, representing the top 1% of professional speakers in the world. He is a Fellow of the Institute of Management Consultants, one of only two people in history holding both those designations.

His prolific publishing includes over 500 articles and 60 books, including his best-seller, Million Dollar Consulting (from McGraw-Hill) now in its 30th year and sixth edition. His newest is Legacy: Life is not about a search for meaning but the creation of meaning (Routledge, 2021). His books have been on the curricula at Villanova, Temple University, and the Wharton School of Business, and have been translated into 15 languages.

His career has taken him to 60 countries and 49 states. (He is afraid to go to North Dakota.) Success Magazine cited him in an editorial devoted to his work as “a worldwide expert in executive education.” The New York Post called him “one of the most highly regarded independent consultants in America.” He is the winner of the prestigious Axiem Award for Excellence in Audio Presentation. He is the recipient of the Lifetime Achievement Award of the American Press Institute, the first-ever for a non-journalist, and one of only seven awarded in the 65-year history of the association. He holds an annual Thought Leadership Conference which draws world-famous experts as speakers.

He has coached former candidates for Miss Rhode Island/Miss America in interviewing skills. He once appeared on the popular American TV game show Jeopardy, where he lost badly in the first round to a dancing waiter from Iowa. Alan is married to the lovely Maria for 52 years, and they have two children and twin granddaughters. They reside in East Greenwich, RI with their dogs, Coco and Bentley, a white German Shepherd.