The hard truth about why some of your best work won’t land — and what to do about it
It was one of my best decks.
Clear narrative. Real insights. Execution roadmap broken down by quarter, channel, team. Every stakeholder aligned in the briefing phase.
I had lived inside that strategy.
And for about 48 hours, it seemed like everyone else would too.
Then… nothing.
No rollout.
No follow-up meeting.
No questions, no pushback, no action.
Just silence.
And that’s when I learned something that changed the way I approach every strategy conversation now:
A great strategy is worthless if the organisation isn’t ready to receive it.
Strategy is more than a deck
For a long time, I believed in the power of the big deck.
The “here’s the plan” moment.
The satisfying structure, the bold bets, the clear next steps.
But the truth?
Strategy isn’t a presentation. It’s a process.
A conversation that continues after the slides. A set of choices that only work when people are ready to own them.
That deck I made? It didn’t fail because it lacked insight.
It failed because:
- The leadership team changed priorities a week later
- The person who was supposed to drive it quit
- The team was too stretched to adopt yet another plan
- The energy in the room died the moment the meeting ended
Execution isn’t guaranteed — even when there’s agreement
Everyone nods in the room.
Everyone agrees it makes sense.
But “alignment” in a meeting isn’t the same as commitment in the real world.
No one says: “This is wrong.”
They just quietly don’t act on it.
And that’s worse. Because it creates the illusion that you did your job.
When really, the strategy was never integrated into how the business actually works.
What I learned (and now ask) before delivering any strategy
Now, before I even open a Keynote file, I ask:
- Who owns this? And do they have the bandwidth to drive it?
- Is leadership going to back this — not just approve it?
- What existing systems need to change for this to work?
- Is this team ready to trade comfort for change?
- What does success look like in the first 30 days?
If I don’t get real answers, I scale the ambition down — not the thinking, but the delivery plan.
Because a 7/10 strategy implemented is better than a 10/10 deck no one reads again.
What this means for founders and marketers
If you’re about to invest in a strategy — brand, digital, growth, or otherwise — ask yourself:
“Is my org ready to absorb this?
Or are we collecting another shiny document to feel productive?”
The best strategy doesn’t live in your Google Drive.
It lives in your systems.
In your culture.
In your weekly standups and hiring plans and campaign calendars.
It doesn’t start or end with a deck.
It lives — or dies — in your execution rhythm.
TL;DR
The best strategy deck I made was the one no one used.
It taught me that timing, ownership, and follow-through matter more than frameworks.
So today, I don’t just help teams write strategy.
I help them build the muscle to implement it.
Because real strategy isn’t what’s on the slide —
It’s what gets done.
And if you want strategy that actually moves, not just impresses — you know who to Ask.