My guess that in the next 10 years - implementation comes out as the winner here. You're seeing huge strat firms like Mckinsey shifting there already.

1 - There are already way too many implementation companies.2 - McK would never go into it, as long back they already had a chance to sell s/w but Marvin Bower was against it, as he didn't want to shift McK from what they were good at. I hope the current leaders follow suit.

This question is deeply flawed and both posters' points of views are uninformed.Strategy and implementation is not a dichotomy, as any fule kno.

Apologies, when I said implementation, I meant "IT implementation". Coming from an IT background, I can see how I made a mistake. I now understand what "implementation" you mean.