The Six Disciplines of Strategic Thinking

THE DISCIPLINE OF PATTERN RECOGNITION

people in evenmore challenging strategy games. In 2017, AlphaGo, a ​deep-​learning system designed by Google’s DeepMind unit, decisively defeated Ke Jie, the world’s ​top-​ranked Go professional. 3 The good news, at least for now, is that emerging AI sys tems augment and amplify business leaders’ p​attern-​recognition​ abilities – ​and the other disciplines of strategic t​hinking – ​and don’t replace them. That’s because the domains in which you operate are not just complex and uncertain, they are also volatile and ambiguous. To be an effective part of a symbiotic h​uman–​ AI system, you will still need the ability to discern important patterns amid a sea of noise and leverage those insights to frame the most important problems, ask the right questions, prioritize action and mobilize your organization. Your creativity and vision too will remain important in an era when competition intensi fies, technological progress accelerates, and political and environmental crises are business as usual. How does pattern recognition work? Executives who are good at pattern recognition match their obser vations about what is happening in the world to their memory patterns. That helps them to rapidly identify what is important to focus on. Strategic thinkers leverage their mental models to “make sense” of what is going on and translate insight into action. At its best, pattern recognition involves going beyond per ceiving the events around us. It’s about understanding their broader significance and anticipating how the already dynamic business landscape will likely evolve. Jack Welch, the late former CEO of General Electric (GE) and one of America’s most influ ential business leaders, noted: “Seeing around corners is what

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