Heightened risk and growing uncertainty make it especially futile for companies to predict the future. Lowell Bryan recommends instead using a portfolio-of-initiatives approach to strategy. The idea behind this 8-page article is sound but has been covered more thoroughly elsewhere. The author’s hypothetical example of a portfolio-of-initiatives approach comes from a financial company and includes the idea—familiar from real options theory—of staging investments. This allows strategists to change direction continually so long as rigorous monitoring is kept up.

Bryan sets out three elements vital to a portfolio-of-initiatives approach then explains how to manage this approach. Perhaps the most useful aspect of this article is the 9-cell grid, a matrix that enables the strategist to rapidly view the economics at stake, the risk level of the investments, and the time horizon until maturity of each initiative.

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