Focus Is a Strategy: Redefining Focus in the AI Age
"You can do anything, but you can't do everything." That old adage has never felt more relevant, or more insufficient. In the AI age, the sheer volume of possibilities has exploded. It's never been easier to imagine, prototype, and ship. Every week brings a new capability, a new feature, a new threat, or a new opportunity. And for product and innovation leaders, that makes focus feel almost impossible. But the problem isn't just the volume of opportunity. It's the definition of focus itself. To navigate this new era, we need to evolve how we think about strategic focus, because when everything feels like it matters, nothing really does.
The New Problem: Strategy Fatigue
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We're seeing a new kind of organizational burnout. Call it strategy fatigue or strategy whiplash. It's what happens when companies constantly shift their priorities, reorg their teams, or pivot their roadmaps in reaction to the latest AI feature, startup launch, or industry headline. Shiny pennies are now a dime a dozen. The siren song of the latest features can give leaders serious FOMO - questioning if what they're doing is 'the right thing'.
Harvard Business Review recently reported that 85% of senior leaders have noticed a dramatic uptick in transformation projects in the past five years. We see it across our client base; companies feeling the pressure to try everything, hedging bets in ten directions instead of doubling down on one.
In this environment, focus isn't just hard... it feels like a risk. But the real risk is burning out your teams and losing strategic coherence chasing optionality.
A New Way to Think About Focus
At LCA, we believe the definition of focus has to change based on altitude. The higher up you are, the more still your compass should be. The lower down, the more fluid and exploratory you must become.
Here's how we break it down:
1. Macro Focus: Steady at the Top
At the leadership level, focus needs to be durable. It's not about this quarter's feature set or the next AI announcement - it's about conviction. It's about answering these questions clearly and consistently:
- What do we stand for?
- Who are we building for?
- What kind of future are we trying to shape?
That's your North Star.
It should be boring in the best way. Repeat it often. Build rituals around it. Make sure every team can point to it and say, "This is what we're doing, and why."
Conviction at the macro level creates alignment and psychological safety. It allows for creativity within a strategic container.
2. Micro Focus: Flexible at the Edges
At the team level, the game changes. Execution needs to be nimble. You're not just keeping the lights on—you're making them shine brighter, and sometimes inventing entirely new ones.
Some teams should be laser-focused on optimizing the core: shipping quality, improving the customer journey, maintaining excellence. But others, sometimes separate innovation teams, sometimes embedded pods, need to push boundaries. They're prototyping new ideas, running experiments, pressure-testing what's next.
A Simple Framework to Balance Focus and Innovation
At LCA, we believe the definition of focus has to change based on altitude. The higher up you are, the more still your compass should be. The lower down, the more fluid and exploratory you must become.
Here's how we break it down:
| Altitude | Focus Type | Strategy |
|---|---|---|
| Macro (Leadership) | Clear North Star | Define durable vision, values, and long-term strategic pillars. We use storytelling, product sense, and design to visualize the future bringing clarity to entire organizations |
| Mid-Level (Teams) | Strategic Execution | Align roadmaps to pillars; optimize and ship against clear objectives. Know what to say no to, and what to accelerate. |
| Micro (Pods/Pilots) | Experimentation Mode | Run lean, validated tests; evaluate against impact and feasibility. This is you can help find signal in noise, and bring insights to leadership before they ask “How are we thinking about generative AI?” |
This creates a healthy tension between stability and exploration. Leadership isn't whiplashing teams with constant re-prioritization, and teams aren't stuck shipping yesterday's strategy and a stale roadmap.
Why it Matters Now, More Than Ever
In the AI age, the pace of change is only going to accelerate. The companies that win won't be the ones that chase every trend. They'll be the ones that:
- Stay anchored to a bold, consistent point of view
- Give their teams room to explore without losing their strategic grip
- Build conviction through evidence, not just hype
Optionality is tempting but clarity builds momentum.
This creates a healthy tension between stability and exploration. Leadership isn't whiplashing teams with constant re-prioritization, and teams aren't stuck shipping yesterday's strategy and a stale roadmap.