The category strategy document is one of the profession’s most reliably wasted artefacts. Considerable effort goes into producing something comprehensive, it is presented to a steering group, and then the category is managed much as it was before.
The problem is usually ownership, not analysis
Strategies produced by procurement, for procurement, describe what procurement will do to a category. The people who actually determine the outcome — the engineers who write the specification, the operations team who set the schedule — were consulted at best. A strategy they did not help write is one they have no reason to follow.
Fewer moves, sequenced
A strategy naming twelve initiatives is a wish list. Three, with an order and an owner each, is a plan. The sequencing matters more than the list: specification work usually has to precede supplier consolidation, and consolidation has to precede any serious negotiation leverage.
Write down what would change your mind
The best category strategies state their assumptions explicitly — what demand is expected to do, where the market is heading, what the supply base is capable of. That makes them reviewable. When an assumption proves wrong, the strategy can be revised rather than quietly abandoned.