Yes: the first step is to determine a winning strategy. At that point, you conceive of it like building a deck in a TCG: what combinations of moves and monsters will win in most scenarios, or in the scenario you want to account for? (much of the metagame is mindgames, anticipating what strategy your opponent will choose as in, which *team* will they even choose).
The second step is, having chosen the Pokemon, getting the best possible Pokemon for that build, which involves IV selection and breeding and subsequent EV training.
The first step is easy-ish because there are a lot of common winning team combinations out there, so you can look at what others use and then use a variation of that which suits your interests. EV training has also been made super-easy for X and Y. IV breeding has been made SLIGHTLY easier because there's a mechanism to guarantee certain traits get passed on, though it's still far and away the most time-consuming part of it.
So
1) Choose your team on paper
2) IV-select and breed to get the best possible Pokemon for each species in that team.
3) EV-train and level up.
Monster Hunter: pissing me off since 2010.
