Why we suck at simple things?

Walking 10,000 steps a day is simple. Eating less junk food is simple. Saving money is simple. Yet millions of people fail at these things every day. The problem is not understanding what to do. The problem is doing it consistently. Organisations suffer from exactly the same disease.

That is what struck me when reading Rita McGrath’s brilliant HBR article on strategic centering. The idea sounds almost embarrassingly simple: pick a center, decide what matters, allocate resources, ignore the rest. Lisa Bodell, author of Why Simple Wins and a CEO of FutureThink, has long argued that organisations don’t suffer from a lack of ideas, but from an inability to simplify. And yet almost no one does it. Why?

Because simple is not the same as easy. Ask any leader and you get the same list: business is complex, there is too much to do, cash flow needs constant watching, every investment carries risk, the supply chain throws a new problem every week, and resources are always too thin. Meanwhile the gap between the number of people on the payroll and the number actually creating value widens by the day.

Then add speed. The pace of change right now is unlike anything we have lived through, and it is not only AI. Markets, regulation, and the entire operating environment are all moving at once.

Bring the customer in the picture. People have never been more selective, or better equipped to compare you against everyone else in three taps. Not long ago, decent SEO and a tidy set of social ads were enough to bring customers in. Not anymore. Even with Meta posting record revenues, paid social’s standalone punch is fading as audience saturation, algorithm changes throttling organic reach, and rising acquisition costs push brands toward creators and influencers instead.

And then, of course, AI. Every conversation sounds the same: we are already late, the costs are brutal, and half the promised value has not shown up. And the real bottleneck is not technical, it is leadership. AI only drives organisational growth when it lands at the team and function level, not just with a few keen individuals. And you cannot wire AI into a company whose strategy, data, and priorities are scattered everywhere.

Here is the uncomfortable truth: leaders can no longer see their own company clearly. The sheer volume of data and noise a leader has to make sense of has become its own protein-folding problem waiting for the Nobel price. It is simply too big to crack by gut or by spreadsheet. You cannot hold a center you cannot see. And you cannot move people and money the moment things shift if you are flying on instinct.

Which brings us back to the steps. Nobody hits 10k a day by simply wanting it more. A tracker helps: it counts every step, shows you the gap, and nudges you before the day runs out. But the tracker does not walk for you. It makes the goal visible; the discipline to keep going is still yours. The world has become infinitely more complex, but the winning formula remains surprisingly simple: know what matters and focus relentlessly on it.

The challenge is that maintaining focus has never been harder. Every dashboard, every initiative, every AI project, every market shift competes for attention. Without visibility, leaders start reacting instead of leading. Resources drift. Priorities multiply. Performance declines.

Strategic centering is therefore not a strategy exercise. It is an execution discipline. The right tools can make the gap visible, but they will not close it for you. The companies that win the next decade will not be the ones with the most data, the most AI, or the biggest budgets. They will be the ones that know what matters, measure it relentlessly, and have the discipline to ignore everything else. The problem isn’t complexity. The problem is losing focus in the face of complexity.

Interested in Strategic Centering?

Together with Rita McGrath, we’re developing a new approach to help organisations continuously align strategy, investments, and execution. Learn more about the initiative and express interest in early access to receive updates as it develops.

For organisations willing to help define what this becomes. For leaders who want to influence, not just implement.