Where Strategy Really Begins?
Why input and diagnosis matter more now that AI makes output cheap
AI can now produce strategic outputs in minutes: positionings, frameworks, scenarios. So where does the advantage lie? Earlier in the process, is what we feed into our thinking and how well we define the problem.
The three stages of strategy
A positioning, a business plan, an innovation pipeline, a deck with recommendations: these are what strategy produces, not strategy itself. Strategy is the process of understanding reality well enough to make choices within it.
That process moves through three stages.
Input is everything that feeds strategic thinking: data, observations and questions; human experiences, observed contradictions, assumptions and different perspectives; behavioral data and market research; the theories and earlier conclusions we draw on. Diagnosis interprets that input into a problem worth solving. Output is the choice the process ends in: a strategic direction, a positioning, an idea to put into practice.
Input is therefore not just the material that precedes the work. It is part of strategy itself.
The paradox of the AI era
Right now, we are overly focused on output. We want more ideas, more concepts, more scenarios, more alternatives, until we reach the one we consider final. AI has made producing them remarkably fast, which is a major step forward. But it creates a paradox.
As more people can produce output, output alone stops being a competitive advantage. A well-structured framework, ten innovation territories, an elegant positioning full of impressive words: all of these are now within reach of far more people. Companies use the same models, draw on similar public knowledge, follow the same trends, and ask for similar tools to solve similar problems.
The results may look different, but the thinking behind them often starts from the same place. Beautiful outputs risk getting lost in a sea of formulaic sameness.
There is a second risk. AI can give you ten excellent answers in minutes, but if the original question is wrong, you end up with ten excellent answers to the wrong problem.
The advantage moves upstream
When processing becomes more powerful and less expensive, advantage shifts toward the material being processed: the input. This is where primary market research may have more strategic value than ever.
Behavioral data and digital analytics show us what people do: what they buy, what they stop using, where they click, what they search for, how often they return. But behavior only records choices already made. It cannot tell us why people made them, or what they have started to want but do not yet act on.
Strategy needs to understand that part of reality too. A need that is just beginning to emerge. A new trade-off entering consumers’ decisions. A disappointment, a contradiction, a change in how people define value. A different reason behind two behaviors that look the same.
If primary research only confirms what we already know, it is costly, and its value is underestimated. At its best, research that generates original insight brings a new reality into the way we think. That insight then feeds the diagnosis as original input, which keeps the diagnosis from being generic.
Diagnosis: the first 60% of strategic work
As a rule of thumb, diagnosis, together with the input it draws on, takes up roughly 60% of the strategic work, because it defines the space in which all the thinking that follows will take place. In that sense it is less a preliminary step than the first part of strategy itself.
Before deciding what to do, we need to understand what is changing, why it is changing, who is changing, what new need is emerging, which assumption no longer holds, and which opportunity is not yet clearly visible. Diagnosis means defining reality accurately: separating causes from symptoms, identifying who and what the strategy needs to address first, and looking at the truth openly, without defending what we already believe or have done so far.
Mathematical optimization offers a useful parallel: before searching for the best solution, you define the space in which solutions can exist.* Diagnosis does something similar for strategy, with one difference. It defines not only what is possible, but what is worth solving.
The stakes are high. If you diagnose the wrong problem, you can build an excellent solution to something that did not need solving. If your reading of where the market is heading is superficial, you will identify the same opportunities as everyone else. Recognizing a shift before it becomes obvious is where diagnosis creates real value.
Think of a three-point shot in basketball. The score is decided at the basket, but the shot was good because of what the player noticed and judged before taking it. Strategy works the same way. It does not begin with the final decision recorded in the meeting notes. It begins when we decide what is worth understanding. Diagnosis finds the question truly worth answering, which often matters more than how good the answer is.
Then comes the remaining 40%: the choice.
Στρατηγική διάγνωση, ή αλλιώς η στρατηγική πριν από τη στρατηγική
When diagnosis leads to innovation
The value of diagnosis is clearest when it leads to something people can use. That is the thinking behind EVA, Eurobank’s first AI digital assistant. Our work began with understanding the people it would serve, and it helped shape the assistant’s concept, name, and implementation.
Truberries’ contribution to EVA was recognized in the Innovative Solutions section of the UX | CX Awards 2026. For us, it illustrates this newsletter’s central idea: when we ask the right questions first, research can become innovation that improves everyday experiences.
Read the story behind EVA and the award.
*Note: In mathematical optimization, the set of options that satisfy all the constraints is called the feasible region, and optimization searches for the best solution within it (see Boyd & Vandenberghe, Convex Optimization, Cambridge University Press, 2004). On the strategy side, Richard Rumelt’s Good Strategy Bad Strategy (2011) makes a related point: the core of a good strategy begins with a diagnosis that defines the challenge.
