As an old Army guy I can help with this. Strategic is big picture and long term planning as opposed to tactical which is focused on execution and near term goa

As an old Army guy I can help with this. Strategic is big picture and long term planning as opposed to tactical which is focused on execution and near term goals. From the Army perspective generally brigade elements and higher are strategic while everything below the brigade level is tactical. For example let's say I need to truck some supplies out to soldiers. Clearly you will need one or more trucks (a convoy), personnel, and things to put into those trucks. At that level everything is tactical. There is still a LOT of planning that must happen because you must account for security, coordinating communications, driving routes, local peoples, fuel, and so on. This is all tactical. If the convoy is large enough it could comprise the entirety of a transportation company with oversight and coordination from its parent, the battalion. A great many people are involved and there is a tremendous amount of funding to successfully pull this off, but its still just tactical. Now, let's think big picture. Let's say I wanted to advance my Army into a new hostile location and keep all the soldiers well supplied. This requires much more than a battalion and does not happen quickly. There required planning effort may have taken a year and there are more outside parties to coordinate with. You also need to enable new infrastructure both on the ground, communication, and administrative. That takes very high levels of authorization to ensure the soldiers on the ground have the support they need and that resources remain available from the highest levels of military planning. This is all strategic. Its not greater or more brilliant than tactical planning, but there are more pieces involved and it takes much longer to accomplish. In the corporate world let's say you want to start doing business in Japan when your company has never done business in Asia before. This is strategic. Finding the real estate and setting up the WAN network are all tactical. Its more specialized. Another way to think about it is distance between execution and the risk analysis in planning. The more immediately identifiable a risk becomes the more tactical it becomes. That does not mean the given risk is less risky or more easily solved just because its more tactical than strategic. Often strategic planning is not necessarily about solving for any risk but instead identifying potential risks might be sufficient.