Product Strategy for High Technology Companies

In the late 1970s, Adam Osborne was considered by many to be a visionary of the fledgling microcomputer industry. He published his views on its technology and markets in books and magazine articles. In 1981, he introduced the Osborne 1, a portable computer with bundled software that sold for $1,795. His vision was a computer for the masses—not the

Yet it is typical of a company that confuses general goals or a mission statement with a core strategic vision.

A CSV is the answer to three absolutely basic questions: Where do we want to go? How will we get there? And why do we think we will be successful?

Who’s Responsible for Vision? Our hapless CEO is a good example of another recurring problem at high-tech companies: the question of who is responsible for the strategic vision. Is it the board of directors, the CEO, or the executive team? After six months on the job, Lou Gerstner, CEO of IBM in 1993, was pressured to give his vision for IBM. He wa

Some companies appear to be blind or at least sleepwalking. They just keep moving along contentedly until they hit a wall without ever seeing it coming. Because they lacked a vision to show them what was…

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Without any deliberate process for evaluating a core strategic vision, it’s all too easy for executives in a company to neglect it. They may have the best intentions and know that it’s something they need…

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Product strategy is like a roadmap, and like a roadmap it’s useful only when you know where you are and where you want to go. What we call a core strategic vision (CSV) provides the destination and the general direction from where you currently stand.

business market opportunity would unfold and what the best role was for IBM. Gerstner began to position IBM to take advantage of this opportunity, but couldn’t immediately articulate a vision that would have credibility. If he had described it prematurely it would have been attacked, for, at best, the vision would have been only partially formulate

Need for Clarification A clarification of core strategic vision is not a change in direction. It is merely a matter of bringing the vision more clearly into focus so the company can better achieve it. Typically, with a clarification, one element will change slightly, but the general direction remains the same.