Almost time perhaps to have strategy in place (7)
I believe the answer is:
implant
'place' is the definition.
The answer and definition can be both related to thinking as well as being verbs in their base form.
Maybe you can see an association between them that I can't see?
'almost time perhaps to have strategy' is the wordplay.
'almost' means to remove the last letter (most of the word but not all of it).
'perhaps' indicates an anagram.
'to have' indicates putting letters inside.
'strategy' becomes 'plan' (I've seen this before).
'time' with its last letter removed is 'tim'.
'tim' anagrammed gives 'imt'.
'imt' enclosing 'plan' is 'IMPLANT'.
'in' acts as a link.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for implant that I've seen before include "Artificial insert in body" , "get fixed" , "Fix securely and deeply" , "Insert or fix into the body" , "material (medical)" .)