Strategy often begins with a SWOT analysis of your company's strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats.  Having an experienced facilitator can help uncover issues and advantages and focus the strategic team on dealing with these -- this can energize the team and improve alignment to the strategy.

As strategies are developed and fleshed out each potential part must be developed, analyzed and ultimately compared with others -- this leads to selection and resourcing of the most important to the company.

Portfolio management is another method critical to the strategic process as multiple opportunities arise.  Keeping a dashboard of active projects along with the next tier of desirable projects makes planning much easier.  Porfolio management formalizes the ongoing addition and selection of potential projects.

Risk management can also be applied to strategies, projects and programs.  This is an evaluation of internal and external risks as well as assessing the impact of those risks and assumptions.