Guarding Your Strategic Time

The words tactical and strategic get thrown around a lot in business, but the difference between them has profound implications for how CEOs spend their time.

The CEO’s tactical tasks (typically reactive) are the ones that yield results in the short term, within hours, days, or weeks. They include the basic day-to-day work of following up on action items and making in-the-moment decisions, plus dealing with the stuff that gets thrown on your plate: What do we do about this data breach? A key account is upset; how should we handle?

The CEO’s strategic tasks (typically proactive) are the ones that yield results on a longer time scale: months, quarters, years, and beyond. They include things like analysis of competitive strategy, tracking and adjustment of 3–5-year objectives, exploration of opportunities for M&A or product innovation, evaluating the company’s talent strategy, and communicating to stakeholders about these issues in ways that inspire and align them.

Here’s my rule of thumb f…