What's the difference between strategy and tactics? It's sometimes not very clear, and the words are often mixed up. As a word, "strategic" is considerably overused, especially in the fields of PR and communications, where it can be interchanged with that dreadful expression "thinking outside the box". So what is the difference?
About.com explains, Vision, Strategy and Tactics thus:
Vision: What you want the organization to be; your dream
Strategy: What you are going to do to achieve your vision
Tactics: How you will achieve your strategy and when
Note the "what", then the "how".
A more elegant definition of the difference between strategy and tactics comes from the military strategist Carl von Clausewitz: "Tactics teaches the use of armed forces in the engagement; strategy, the use of engagements for the object of the war."
As mentioned on our home page, agencies like this one, when trying to sound meaningful, use the word "strategy" a lot but in fact we are (and should be) the place that our clients go to for the tactical implementation of their strategies.
Anyway, a word about strategy. A successful strategy shouldn't be changed very often, especially in the context of healthcare. In the healthcare world, commercial marketing roles change often and regularly, let's say on average every two years. Clinical customers, on the other hand, will change their roles every 5, 10 or 15 years, and often within the same organisation. They have long memories. So while it's tempting for us in the commercial world to initiate short term strategies in one job, and then change the pre-existing when we move on to the next one, it might not be in our customers' best long term interests.
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