Nmblr Pathfinder Step 2: Strategic Options
Purpose of this step: To explore different ways you could win at your chosen leverage points, before deciding which route to take. This step turns “where we might focus” into a set of clear, contrasting strategic choices, not just a longer list of tactics.
Guidance: what you do in this step
- Start from the leverage points
Take the 1–3 leverage points you identified from the patient flow (e.g. “initiation in 2L”, “persistence in [segment]”, “specialist referral from primary care”).
For each, get the team to brainstorm strategic options. Stay at the level of choices, not activities
Note a strategic option should describe who you will win with and how, not a list of channels.
Use a simple structure for each option:
- Stakeholder: Who are we primarily trying to influence?
- Behaviour: What do we need them to do differently, consistently?
- Insight: What is the unmet need that we can address that will unlock the behaviour?
- Driver: What must they believe for that behaviour to feel natural and right? [informed by the insight]
- Generate multiple, contrasting ways to win
- For each leverage point, aim for several different options, not variations of the same idea. For example, options that:
- Focus on different stakeholders (e.g. specialists vs. PCPs vs. payers).
- Emphasise different behaviours (e.g. earlier diagnosis vs. earlier initiation vs. better persistence).
- Specify what the stakeholder needs to believe to compel the desired behaviour.
- Use your insight base as fuel: what you know about needs, barriers, motivations and context.
- For each leverage point, aim for several different options, not variations of the same idea. For example, options that:
- Keep options imaginative but grounded
- Check that every option still connects directly to:
- The leverage point in the flow.
- The winning focus you’ve agreed.
- Real insights, not wishful thinking.
- Check that every option still connects directly to:
- Sharpen and name the options you want to take forward
- Give each option a short, memorable name that captures its essence.
- Merge near-duplicates; keep options that are meaningfully different.
- Capture, in a sentence or two, why this could be powerful at that leverage point - the rationale.
- Resist deciding too early
- At this stage you are creating and shortlisting options, not choosing them.
- Avoid scoring, ranking or jumping to “the answer”. That happens in Step 3, once conditions for success are visible.
By the end of Step 2 you should have a small portfolio of well-formed strategic options. At least one for each possible leverage point: clear who they target, what behaviour they aim to change, and which belief would unlock that change.