Stop Managing Strategy Like Spock, Start Leading With Humanity.
When agencies strip planning of imagination, they kill its power; giving planners freedom fuels breakthroughs.
Why Strategy Has Lost its Edge
Strategy was never meant to be a purely mechanical process. Yet, in today’s agencies, it often looks exactly that: endless templates, proprietary models, and decks designed to sell certainty. According to Steve Walls (2025), this obsession with predictability has turned planners into bureaucrats, more concerned with filling boxes than finding breakthroughs.
The irony is sharp. Advertising thrives on uncertainty, yet strategists are pressured to act like Mr. Spock, all logic, no risk, no imagination. Agencies have asked planners to be the guardians of process, the “serious people” who make creativity look valid to finance-driven clients. The result? Planning has become boring. Safe. And, dangerously, irrelevant.
The Myth of Insight
Why Chasing Insight has Become Snake Oil
For years, strategists have sold the magic of “insight.” But as Walls notes, too often this boils down to clichés: “authenticity,” “lonelier than ever,” or “Gen Alphabet.” Creatives roll their eyes, and rightly so. Chasing the next “insight” has become a crutch for unimaginative planners.
The real work of strategy is not to generate another predictable phrase. It is to confront uncomfortable truths, reframe problems, and open new territories for brands to play in. A planner’s job is not to inspire creatives with overused tropes; it is to set a direction so provocative that creatives are eager to chase it.
Brand Case
Calvin Klein (Jeremy Allen White campaign, 2024): Strategists defended work that was “idea free”, not another grand narrative, just raw presence and cultural truth. Instead of diluting it with tired insights, they trusted the work to speak for itself, driving cultural conversation and brand relevance.
Strategy: A Creative Act
Planning is Not a Process, it is Imagination
Walls reminds us that planning is fundamentally creative, not formal. Great strategists don’t hide behind models; they throw them away. They immerse themselves in people, products, subcultures, and behaviors. They write briefs that serve as springboards, not constraints.
The best strategists are anarchic, dissatisfied, and unafraid to upset the status quo. They defend uncomfortable truths, like telling a client they sell “dead food in cardboard coffins”, because honesty creates the conditions for breakthrough creativity. Strategy without imagination is just management.
Brand Case
Heinz (Ridiculously Late Sauce, 2021): Strategy reframed Heinz’s ketchup delays not as a weakness but as proof of authenticity. This leap of imagination, seeing lateness as strength, created a viral cultural moment and sales spike.
The Risk of Playing it Safe
How Process-Driven Planning Kills Creativity
Planning has been reduced to status meetings, slide decks, and cover-your-ass briefings. In this environment, strategists have become risk managers, not growth drivers. When strategy plays it safe, creativity dies.
Research confirms this pattern. IPA Effectiveness Awards data (2019, UK sample) shows that emotionally led, creatively ambitious campaigns are twice as likely to deliver long-term profit growth compared to rational, low-risk campaigns. Yet agencies continue to train planners to be risk-averse.
Brand Case
Burger King (Moldy Whopper, 2020): A radical strategy reframed the absence of preservatives as a shocking visual truth. Initially polarizing, it drove double-digit brand health gains in Europe (Kantar, 2020). A safe planner would never have signed it off.
Less Vulcan, More Human
The Permission and Protection Planners Need
If the industry is to save strategy, it must give planners both permission and protection. Permission to take leaps of faith, follow hunches, and embrace the irrational. Protection from bureaucrats who demand client-friendly slides instead of truth.
Walls argues the future of planning depends on senior leaders stepping up to shield young strategists, giving them the time and space to explore. Agencies must replace the “Mr. Spock” expectation with a more human model: strategists who lead with empathy, imagination, and honesty.
Brand Case
Nike (Dream Crazy, 2018): Strategists defended Colin Kaepernick’s controversial presence against safe voices. The result: a campaign that sparked culture, boosted stock 5% in a week (CNBC, 2018), and cemented Nike’s position as a brand of conviction.
CEO-Level Imperatives
Kill The Deck Obsession: Demand fewer slides, more truth. Stop paying for process, start demanding perspective.
Ban Insight Theater: Prohibit clichés masquerading as insights. If a phrase could fit any category, it’s useless.
Protect Young Planners: Leaders must body-tackle bureaucracy to give strategists freedom to play.
Reward Unreasonable Strategy: Encourage leaps of faith, not logical guarantees. Great brands are built on unreasonable bets.
Make Planning Creative Again: Hold strategists accountable for imagination, not just analysis.
Bottom Line: Human Strategy Beats Robotic Logic
The future of strategy is not about more models, more data, or more slides. It is about re-humanizing the discipline, giving planners permission to be bold, unreasonable, and honest. When strategy excites, everything else follows. Agencies that continue to force their planners into Spock-like roles will strangle creativity and stunt growth. Those that unleash the human side of strategy will unlock the cultural and commercial breakthroughs the industry so desperately needs.
