What goes into a successful strategy? To start, it’s critical to be able to separate planning from strategy. During a recent episode of Empowered Owners, the podcast from Empowered Ventures, EV CEO Chris Fredericks and Chief of Staff Emily Bopp explored the differences between the two often-intertwined concepts.
Emily quoted a breakdown that has been making its rounds on social media and in publications like Harvard Business Review from Roger Martin, professor emeritus at Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto. He said strategy is “an integrated set of choices that positions you on a playing field of your choice in a way that you win.”
Building out from this discussion, here’s a concise version of Empowered Ventures’ strategy:
- Acquire great businesses.
- Steward them well.
- Use employee ownership to improve our businesses and change the lives of our employees.
- Tell our story well, especially the impact on sellers and their employees.
In a recent LinkedIn post, Chris said: “We believe if we do all these well, we will attract a growing number of great businesses and people, which will compound over time and create a large, world-class, enduring, diversified employee-owned holding company.
Our aim is to create life-changing outcomes for our current and future employees and do so over the course of decades or even centuries. We are early in this effort, but the results so far have been validating. I’m excited for the future and super grateful to everyone I get to work with to make this happen!”
Want to learn more? Reach out.
