3 agreements business leaders need to establish to make their strategy actionable and accessible

Nearly every leader I talk to knows the old planning model doesn’t make sense anymore. Multi-month cycles. Layers upon layers of initiatives. Budgets that quietly replace strategy as the plan. By the time it’s all done, the competitive landscape has already shifted under their feet. And yet, many companies still do it this way. They can feel the mismatch as they strive to move fast. They just don’t know what to do instead. The old game was setting direction. Decide where to go. Communicate it. Cascade it down. It made sense when the future looked enough like the past that you could be certain of your choices. But certainty is gone. In its place: disruption, surprise, and acceleration. Which means the work of leaders has shifted. The new game is adapting direction.

What needs to be new and different

If strategy execution today is about improv, then strategy setting is no longer about choreography. It requires a more flexible approach. Here are four flaws of traditional strategy planning, and what leaders can do differently:

1. Stop pretending there’s only one future.

We know the future won’t unfold exactly as envisioned. Customer needs shift. Competitors surprise you. Economies wobble. So why do we plan for just one version of what’s next? When one “winning” idea emerges too fast, it often gets momentum without being stress-tested. A better approach:evaluate multiple distinct directions at the same time. One executive team we worked with had five competing visions for doubling the business in three years. Instead of forcing consensus, we worked with them to think through the core choices for each, including customer focus, product bets, and geographic expansion. Once leaders saw the real implications, they quickly ruled one option out. The eventual plan blended elements of the others, with contingencies built in. Thinking through alternatives gave them confidence and resilience when the inevitable twists came.

2. Make choices real before you announce them

Too many strategic plans race to the declaration moment at the Town Hall: here’s the big idea, now go execute. The problem? Leaders rarely know what they’ve actually signed up for, or what needs to change in how the work gets done. If you believe that strategy execution requires improv, then even in setting strategy you need to imagine what comes next and rehearse moves, implications, and ripple effects across future time horizons, albeit in a simpler but realistic form. One client we worked with knew that acquisitions were essential to their growth. They had several targets in sight and negotiations underway, but no imminent deal. Instead of waiting, we ran the extended leadership team through a series of acquisition scenarios with different strategic intent that examined variables such as deal size, level of integration, and adjacency of the added business. As they worked through each scenario, they not only got a view into the nature of potential targets but also what changes they, as the leaders of the organization, needed to make now. They were choosing what kind of organization they would become. Based on what they were learning, they were able to make key decisions to position themselves for future success. They agreed on new hiring profiles, streamlined decision processes, leadership shifts, so they’d be ready when the right deal came. Strategy shifted from a conceptual statement to a real, lived preparation for a different future.

3. Work across time horizons.

People can change fast. Infrastructure and capital cannot. Budgets, board approvals, and physical assets move slowly. Leaders need to intentionally plan for what can change now, what will take time, and what’s locked in, while still identifying the opportunities at each stage. Take a pharma company with a pipeline bursting with new drug development. If even half their drugs made it through approval, their manufacturing capacity would be insufficient. Together we built an adaptable manufacturing plan, anchored on essentials, with clear trigger points for future decisions. When 70% of the drugs cleared approval, they were ready. Without that horizon-based thinking, they would have been caught flat-footed.

4. Align at the right level of detail.

Here’s a trap: mistaking varied interpretation of the strategy for purposeful improvisation. They are not the same. Without clarity and alignment at the top, every leader fills in gaps differently. That isn’t agility, it’s chaos. Leaders must turn the conceptual strategy into something tangible and real, in order to be able to align and lead the organization in the same direction. Strategic modeling allows leaders to test choices at the right level of fidelity, so they know what they’re actually agreeing to. Growing “a lot” versus growing 37% are not the same thing. The detail that is uncovered in the modeling exercises provides enough clarity to shape coherent execution, while still leaving room for adaptive moves over time.

From map to compass

Old strategy setting was about certainty. New strategy setting is about clarity of intent and readiness to adapt. It’s less a map and more of a compass. If your strategy and planning process still looks like a marathon toward a finished plan, ask yourself: are you preparing for the world you wish you had, or the one you actually face? The trick is helping leadership teams shift from setting direction to adapting direction—so strategy setting and execution can adapt. The future won’t wait for your plans.

In today’s business environment, strategy no longer unfolds neatly from vision to execution. Disruption is constant, complexity is accelerating, and expectations are shifting in real time. In this context, strategy that is overly scripted becomes brittle. The organizations that thrive today are the ones that have learned to improvise. Not reactively, but with intention, agility, and confidence. To many executives, the idea of “strategy improv” might sound risky or chaotic. In truth, great improvisation is neither. It is a learned discipline rooted in presence, trust, and adaptability. It is what enables teams to respond purposefully in the face of the unexpected. And it is quickly becoming a core leadership capability for our times.

Why strategy needs to shift

For decades, the dominant model of strategy has been based on control. A select few defined the vision, cascaded goals through layers of the business, and expected execution to follow. Success was measured by fidelity to the plan. The world no longer works that way. Markets are volatile. We are in a technology super cycle. Customer needs evolve faster than product roadmaps. And the economic, geopolitical, and environmental future is increasingly uncertain. Rigid strategies struggle to survive this level of flux. They become outdated before implementation begins. Worse, they force teams into patterns of execution that ignore emerging data, evolving context, or untapped insight. What is needed now is not more precision. What is needed is more adaptability.

Strategy as intention, not prescription

In improvisational terms, a strategic plan is no longer a fixed script. It is a shared intention. It is a direction, not a destination. It is a compass, not a map. The core strategic question is no longer, “What is our five year plan?” but instead: “How do we respond wisely, quickly, and collectively to whatever emerges in service of our purpose?” This does not mean abandoning structure or discipline. In fact, it demands more of both. But the emphasis shifts from defining every move in advance to cultivating the conditions where people can make smart decisions in the moment. Here is the distinction:

• A goal says: “We will grow 17 percent in revenue.”

• An intention says: “To grow 17 percent, we will delight our clients, grow our impact, and operate with excellence to unlock long term value.”

The first is measurable. The second is both meaningful and measurable. And it is meaning that enables action when the path becomes unclear.

What improv really means

Improv in business is ripe for misunderstanding. It is not winging it or hoping for the best. Great improv is highly disciplined. It is grounded in preparation, presence, and shared principles. Here are a few improv principles that matter most for leaders and teams:

• Yes, And… Build on what is already in motion instead of shutting it down. That is how momentum grows.

• Make Your Partner Look Good. Execution is collective. Leaders who elevate others create trust and shared ownership.

• Be Present. You cannot rely on what worked yesterday or predict what comes tomorrow. Execution happens in this moment.

• Listen for What Is New. Do not just confirm your beliefs. Notice weak signals, dissenting voices, and emerging shifts.

• Commit to the Scene. Once you step in, go all in. Half-hearted execution drains energy and derails progress.

These are not stage tricks. They are everyday disciplines for how leaders and teams show up together when the path is not clear.

The boundary: What can and cannot be improvised

Not everything can or should be improvised. You cannot spin up a new factory in six weeks or redo a regulatory filing on the fly. Capital projects, infrastructure, hiring pipelines, and compliance require structure, discipline, and lead time. Within those guardrails, much of execution is improv. The actions and moves you make can and show flex with the need and the moment. Such moves might include:

• How you respond to a customer this week

• How you redeploy resources when a competitor surprises you

• How you adjust product features in response to early user feedback

The art is knowing the difference. Improv lives inside the boundaries, not outside them. And that is where the advantage lies.

We know it works

We have already seen this in action. During COVID, strategy as improv was not optional. Plans dissolved overnight. Leaders had to pivot in real time, trust their teams, and reimagine value on the fly. Many succeeded, not because they had the perfect plan, but because they had the capacity to improvise. Consider two everyday situations:

• Telecommunications company: With hardware and software tightly linked, this company faced constant tension between short-term changes in a release and the permanence of installed infrastructure. By learning to improvise in the short term with software while anchoring their long-term vision in hardware roadmaps, they delivered quick wins without derailing future value. To do so, leaders had to abandon siloed “hardware first” or “software first” thinking and live in both worlds at once.

• Global manufacturer: Preparing for volatility in regulation and transportation, this company had shifted to thinking of its manufacturing footprint as a portfolio of capabilities rather than fixed plants. When sudden shifts hit sooner than expected, they could improvise quickly, rebalancing capacity across countries, not because they were ready but because they had already rehearsed some of the moves. The adjustments were urgent, but they felt planful.

These are not exotic cases. They are reminders that when strategy execution meets reality, it is the organizations that can improvise with purpose that thrive.

From plans to response

The core strategic question has changed. It is no longer, “What is our five year plan?” but instead: “How do we respond wisely, quickly, and collectively to whatever emerges?” Capacity, creativity, and commitment to the purpose and intention of the strategy, not certainty, are now the keys to competitive advantage. Those attributes are built through people: their judgment, their alignment, and their ability to act in service of shared priorities.

How to build strategic improv into your organization

Improv is not just an individual skill. It is an organizational capacity. Here are five practical ways to embed it into how your teams work:

1. Ground the organization in purpose and priorities. Make sure everyone knows the “why” behind your strategy. Not just the outcomes you are chasing, but the value you aim to create. Purpose creates the throughline that allows teams to improvise without drifting.

1. Build enterprise perspective at all levels. Give people visibility into how their choices affect the whole. When teams understand upstream and downstream impacts, they act with greater confidence and coordination.

1. Normalize adaptation, not perfection. Shift the narrative from flawless execution to responsive evolution. Celebrate learning, reward and highlight intelligent risk taking, and treat change as a constant, not a crisis.

1. Practice collective sensemaking. Create space for cross functional conversation, reflection, and signal sensing. Encourage teams to bring forward what they are noticing, not just what they are reporting.

1. Train for improvisation. Just as improv actors practice, so can your leaders. Build their capacity to navigate ambiguity, connect dots, and co-create solutions in real time. The payoff is not just agility. It is resilience.

Final thought

Strategy execution today is less about control and more about capability. It is less about knowing the answers and more about creating the conditions where your people can discover the right answers for now, together. Companies that thrive in uncertainty will not be the ones with the tightest plans. They will be the ones that can improvise with purpose, with confidence, and with each other. When the world will not wait, improv is not optional. It is the new strategic advantage.

In the 1990s, Business Process Reengineering (BPR) was the Big Bet. Companies launched tightly controlled pilot programs with hand-picked teams, custom software, and executive backing. The results dazzled on paper.

But when it came time to scale? Reality hit. People weren’t ready. Systems didn’t connect. Budgets dried up. The pilot became a cautionary tale, not a blueprint.

We’ve seen this before with Lean, Agile, even digital transformations. Now it’s happening again with AI, only this time, the stakes are different. Because we’re not just implementing a new solution, we’re building into a future that’s unfolding. Technology is evolving faster than most organizations can learn, govern, or adapt right now. That uncertainty doesn’t make transformation impossible, but it does make it easier to get wrong.

And the dysfunction is already showing up, just in two very different forms.

Two roads to the same cliff

Today, we see organizations falling into two extremes. Most companies are either overdoing the control or letting AI run wild.

Road 1: The free-for-all

Everyone’s experimenting. Product teams are building bots, prompting, using copilots. Finance is trying automated reporting. HR has a feedback chatbot in the works. Some experiments are exciting. Most are disconnected. There's no shared vision, no scaling pathway, and no learning across the enterprise. It’s innovation by coincidence.

Road 2: The forced march

Leadership declares an AI strategy. Use cases are approved centrally. Governance is tight. Risk is managed. But the result? An impressive PowerPoint, a sanctioned use case, and very little broad adoption. Innovation is constrained before it ever reaches the front lines.

Two very different environments. Same outcome: localized wins, system-wide inertia.

The real problem: Building for optics, not for scale

Whether you’re over-governing or under-coordinating, the root issue is the same: designing efforts that look good but aren’t built to scale.

Here’s the common pattern:

• A team builds something clever.
• It works in their context.
• Others try to adopt it.
• It doesn’t stick.
• Momentum dies. Energy scatters. Or worse, compliance says no.

Sound familiar?

It’s not that the ideas are flawed. It’s that they’re built in isolation with no plan for others to adopt, adapt, or scale them. There’s no mechanism for transfer, no feedback loops for iteration, and no connection to how people actually work across the organization.

So, what starts as a promising AI breakthrough (a smart bot, a helpful copilot, a detailed series of prompts, a slick automation) quietly runs out of road. It works for one team or solves one problem, but without a handoff or playbook, there’s no way for others to plug in. The system stays the same, and the promise of momentum fades, lost in the gap between what’s possible and what’s repeatable.

We’ve seen this before

These aren’t new problems. From BPR to Agile, we’ve learned (and re-learned) that:

• Experiments are not strategies. Experiments show potential, not readiness for adoption. Without a plan to scale, they become isolated wins; interesting, but not transformative.
• Culture is the operating system. If the beliefs, behaviors, and incentives underneath aren’t aligned, the system breaks, no matter how advanced the tools.
• Managers matter. Without their ownership and support, change stalls.
• Behavior beats code. Tools don’t transform companies. People do.

Design thinking promised to bridge this gap with user-driven iteration and empathy. But in practice? Most efforts skip the hard parts. We tinker, test, and move on, without ever building the conditions for adoption.

AI and the new architecture of work

Many organizations treat AI like an add-on—as if it’s something to bolt onto existing systems to boost efficiency. But AI isn’t just a project or a tool; it changes the rules of how decisions are made, how value is created, and what roles even exist. It’s an inflection point that forces companies to rethink how work gets done.

Companies making real progress aren’t just chasing use cases. They’re rethinking how their organizations operate, end to end. They’re asking:

• Have we prepared people to reimagine how they work with AI, not just how to use it?
• Are we redesigning workflows, decision rights, and interactions—not just layering new tech onto old routines?
• Do we know what success looks like when it’s scaled and sustained, not just when it dazzles?

If the answer is no, whether you’re too loose or too locked down, you’re not ready.

The mindset shift AI demands

AI isn’t just a tech rollout. It’s a mindset shift that asks leaders to reimagine how value gets created, how teams operate, and how people grow. But that reimagination isn’t about the tools. The tools will change—rapidly. It starts with new assumptions, new stances, and a new internal leader compass.

Here are three essential mindset shifts every leader must make, not just to keep up with AI but to stay relevant in a world being reshaped by it:

1. From automation to amplification

Old mindset: AI automates tasks and cuts costs.

New mindset: AI expands and amplifies human potential, enhancing our ability to think strategically, learn rapidly, and act boldly. The question isn’t what AI can do instead of us, but what it can do through us—helping people make better decisions, move faster, and focus on higher-value work.

2. From efficiency to reimagination

Old mindset: How can we use AI to make current processes more efficient?

New mindset: What would this process look like if we started from zero with AI as our co-creator, not a bolt-on?

3. From implementation to opportunity building

Old mindset: Roll out the tool. Train everybody. Check the box.

New mindset: AI fluency is a core human capability that creates new realms of curiosity, sophistication in judgment, and opportunity thinking. Soon, AI won’t be a one-time training. It will be part of how we define leadership, collaboration, and value creation.

From sparkles to scale

In most organizations, the spark isn’t the problem. Good ideas are everywhere. What’s missing is the ability to translate those isolated wins into something durable, repeatable, and enterprise-wide.

Too many pilots are built to impress, not to endure. They dazzle in one corner of the business but aren’t designed for others to adopt, adapt, or sustain. The result? Innovation that stays stuck in the lab—or dies.

Designing for scale means thinking beyond the “what” to the “how”:

• How will this spread?
• What behaviors and systems need to change?
• Can this live in our whole world, not just my sandbox?

It’s not about chasing the next use case. It’s about setting up the conditions that allow innovation to take root, grow, and multiply, without starting from scratch every time.

Here’s how to make that shift:

1. Test in the wild, not just in the lab

Skip the polished demo. Put your solution in the hands of real users, in real conditions, with all the friction that comes with it. Use messy data. Invite resistance. That’s where the insights live, and where scale begins. If it only works in ideal settings, it doesn’t work.

2. Mobilize managers

Executives sponsor. Front lines experiment. But it’s team leaders who connect and spread. Equip them as translators and expediters, not blockers. Every leader is a change leader.

3. Hardwire behaviors, not just tools

The biggest unlock in AI is not the model—it’s the muscle. Invest in shared language, habits, and peer learning that support new ways of working. Focus on developing behaviors that scale, such as:

• Change readiness: the ability to spot opportunity, turn obstacles into possibilities, and help teams pivot.
• Coaching: getting the best out of your AI “co-workers” just like human ones.
• Critical thinking: applying human judgment where it matters most—context, nuance, and ethics.

4. Align to a future-state vision

To scale beyond one-off wins, people need a shared sense of where they’re headed. A clear future-state vision acts as an enduring focus, allowing everyone to innovate in concert. That alignment doesn’t stifle innovation. It multiplies it, turning a thousand disconnected pilots into a coherent transformation.

5. Track adoption, not just “wins”

Don’t mistake a shiny, clever prompt for progress. A great experiment means nothing if it can’t be repeated by many people. From day one, design with scale in mind: Can this be adopted elsewhere? What would need to change for it to work across teams, roles, or regions? Build for transfer, not just applause.

The real opportunity

AI will not fail because the tech wasn’t good enough. It will fail because we mistook experiments for solutions, or because we governed innovation into paralysis.

You don’t need more control. You don’t need more chaos. You need design for scale, not just scale in hindsight.

Let’s stop chasing sparkles. Let’s build systems that spread.

Each business revolution has reshaped not only how businesses operate, but how they organize themselves and empower their people. From the industrial age to the information era, and now into the age of artificial intelligence, technology has always brought with it a reconfiguration of authority, capability, and judgment.

In the 19th century, industrialization centralized work and knowledge. The factory system required hierarchical structures where strategy, information, and decision-making were concentrated at the top. Managers at the apex made tradeoffs for the greater good of the enterprise because they were the only ones with access to the full picture.

Then came the information economy. With it came the distribution of information and a need for more agile, team-based structures. Cross-functional collaboration and customer proximity became competitive necessities. Organizations flattened, experimented with matrix models, and pushed decision-making closer to where problems were being solved. What had once been the purview of a select few, judgment, strategic tradeoffs, and insight became expected competencies for managers and team leads across the enterprise.

Now, AI is changing the game again. But this time, it’s not just about access to data. It’s about access to intelligence.

Generative AI democratizes access not only to information, but to intelligent output. That shifts the burden for humans from producing insights to evaluating them. Judgment, which was long the domain of a few executives, must now become a baseline competency for the many across the organization.

But here’s the paradox: while AI extends our capacity for intelligence, discernment, the human ability to weigh context, values, and consequence, is still best left in the hands of human leaders. As organizations begin to automate early-career work, they may inadvertently erase the very pathways and opportunities by which judgment was built.

Why judgment matters more than ever

Deloitte’s 2023 Human Capital Trends survey found that 85% of leaders believe independent decision-making is more important than ever, but only 26% say they’re ready to support it. That shortfall threatens to neutralize the very productivity gains AI promises.

If employees can’t question, challenge, or contextualize AI’s output, then intelligent tools become dangerous shortcuts. The organization stalls, not from a lack of answers, but from a lack of sense-making.

What organizations must do

To stay competitive, organizations must shift from simply adopting AI to designing AI-aware ways of working:

• Build new learning paths for judgment development. As AI replaces easily systematized tasks, companies must replace lost learning experiences with mentorship, simulations, and intentional development planning.

• Design workflows that require human input. Treat AI as a co-pilot, not an autopilot. Embed review checkpoints and tradeoff discussions. Just as innovation processes have stage gates, so should AI analyses.

• Make judgment measurable. Assess and develop decision-making under ambiguity from entry-level roles onward. Research shows the best learning strategy for this is high-fidelity simulations.

• Start earlier. Leadership development must begin far earlier in career paths, because judgment, not just knowledge, is the new differentiator.

What’s emerging is not just a flatter hierarchy, but a more distributed sense of judgment responsibility. To thrive, organizations must prepare their people not to outthink AI, but to out-judge it.

P R E S S R E L E A S E
Stockholm, May 5, 2025

STOCKHOLM, SWEDEN – BTS Group AB (publ), a leading global consultancy specializing in strategy execution, change, and people development, has agreed to acquire Nexo Pesquisa e Consultoria Ltda., Nexo, a boutique consulting firm headquartered in São Paulo, Brazil.

Nexo has been growing continuously since it was founded in 2017. With revenues of approximately 12 million Brazilian Reales (approx. 2.1 million USD) in 2024, and a highly capable team of 21 members, Nexo has built a strong reputation for delivering transformative projects in strategy, innovation, leadership, and culture.

Nexo collaborates with a great portfolio of clients across sectors such as financial services, consumer goods, and technology, assisting both local and global companies in navigating uncertainty, unlocking creativity, and activating strategy through people. Their work encompasses culture transformation, leadership development, employer value proposition, innovation culture, and vision alignment – supported by proprietary methodologies and frameworks.

BTS currently operates in Brazil servicing both local and multinational clients with a team of 13 employees. By acquiring Nexo, BTS not only increases the Group’s footprint in Brazil but also adds significant capabilities in culture and transformation services. Nexo’s client base has limited overlap with BTS, creating strong growth potential and synergy opportunities.

“Nexo is known for helping leaders and organizations tackle some of the most complex, human-centered challenges with creativity, empathy, and strategic clarity and the Nexo team is loved by their clients,” says Philios Andreou, Deputy CEO of BTS Group and President of the Other Markets Unit. “Their products and services complement and elevate our existing offerings, especially in culture transformation, and we are thrilled to welcome the Nexo team to BTS.”

“We’re excited to join BTS. We’ve long admired BTS’s approach and unique portfolio to support large organizations and leaders in connecting strategy with culture across the organization,” says Andreas Auerbach, co founder of Nexo. “Becoming part of BTS, allows us to scale our impact and bring more value to our clients while staying true to our values and culture,” adds Mariana Lage Andrade, co-founder of Nexo.

Upon completion of the transaction, Nexo’s business and organization will merge with BTS Brazil. Nexo’s founders will assume senior management roles in the joint operation.

The acquisition includes a limited initial cash consideration. Additional purchase price considerations will be paid between 2026 and 2028, provided Nexo meets specific performance targets. A limited portion of any such additional purchase price considerations will be paid in newly issued BTS shares. The transaction is effective immediately.

BTS’s acquisition strategy continues to focus on broadening our service portfolio, expanding our geographic reach, and enhancing our capabilities to support future organic growth in a fragmented market.

For more information, please contact:
Philios Andreou
Deputy CEO
BTS Group AB
philios.andreou@bts.com

Michael Wallin
Head of investor relations
BTS Group AB
michael.wallin@bts.com
+46-8-587 070 02
+46-708-78 80 19

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Work today is too complex for individuals to succeed in isolation. Almost every critical decision, innovation, or transformation depends on teams working effectively together. Leaders rely on their teams to deliver results. Teams, in turn, rely on their leaders to create the conditions where performance is possible. This exchange, what leaders need from their teams, and what teams need from their leaders, sits at the heart of what we call teaming.

When teaming is strong, leaders get what they need from their teams [creativity, resilience, execution] and teams get what they need from leaders [direction, support, and the conditions to thrive]. It’s how strategy becomes action, how uncertainty becomes opportunity, and how businesses stay competitive in a fast-changing world.