Strategic Planning: Who needs it anyway?
The term strategic planning is thrown around so often that everyone should be very familiar with it, but what does it really mean? According to the businessdictionary.com, Strategic Planning is:
- A systematic process of envisioning a desired future, and translating this vision into broadly defined goals or objectives and a sequence of steps to achieve them. In contrast to long-term planning (which begins with the current status and lays down a path to meet estimated future needs), strategic planning begins with the desired-end and works backward to the current status. http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/strategic-planning.html#ixzz3hrXVgPpB
If we are to be effective strategic planners, we need to start at the end. You are familiar with the phrase the end justifies the means, and in developing your Strategic Planning mindset it offers the first clue on how to get started. If we don’t know where we are going, how will we know when we get there?
Every organization will benefit from well thought out and detailed strategic plans. I will provide a brief overview of how to get started efficiently and effectively in developing a plan for your organization, regardless if it is for your business, public sector board, non-profit, youth group, church group, or a personal life plan, the steps are the same.
Start with an honest assessment of what the shared vision is for the organization. Hold wide open brainstorming sessions to gather free flowing ideas from all stakeholders. Get off site from your normal meeting spot, you want to eliminate any perceived or real “turf wars” during this exercise. If you have enough participants, break into arbitrary groups (again avoiding typical cliques of people), give each a flip chart and ask the relevant questions you need answered. Samples may be:
- If you had to leave your community for 10 years, describe what you would like to see upon your return?
- Where would you like to see the governing body focus their attention?
- What do you like most about ______?
- Identify and articulate your vision for this plan if there were no obstacles in our path. “If money were no object, what would you change about the _______?”
These are broad samples, yours may be more narrowly defined obviously, and should be inclusive of the entire organization you are strategically planning for (include all departments, volunteers, residents, business owners, etc.).
Next you will begin to review all the input gathered and look for the commonality in the responses. These will tell you where the majority of participants beliefs lie in relation to a shared vision. If you are the CEO or governing board of the group, do these match your beliefs? Why or why not? This is why it is wise to use a facilitator to oversee this exercise. It helps to remove undue influence to maximize the creativity in developing your unique Ends. You should be able to now develop statements around the agreed upon shared vision.
You are now able to develop your Strategic Plan, because now you know what success looks like. The next phase is identifying the goals and objectives that will get you to the end. Remember these need to be SMART goals; specific, measureable, achievable, relevant, and timely. This process will most likely not include the larger group that assisted in the brainstorming phase of earlier, but rather the principles required to get it done. Every goal or objective needs to be vetted using the SMART system. If it doesn’t fit, adjust the goal until it will achieve what we are trying to accomplish. Remember that in strategic planning you are working backwards from the Ends to develop step goals; what must be done at the previous stage to reach here, until you have worked it back to the present.
After the goals and objectives are fleshed out, it’s time to utilize our tactical planning skills. In this phase of the process we shift the focus to developing our tactics required to achieve our goals and objectives. These include the who, what, where, and when statements. Developing your risk mitigating milestones will keep you on track to achieving your goals. Clearly identified timelines for achieving your tactics, and a commitment to accountability, will instill the no fear of failure mentality needed to move forward. Ask for the accountability commitment from everyone. Ask everyone to hold each other accountable. Hang a banner of your strategic plans, goals, and tactics where everyone can see it.
Wow, you have developed a Strategic Plan! Now you can all get back to working on whatever was occupying all of your time before this whole strategic planning business distracted you. Wait, I forgot to mention…Strategic Planning is not a one-time exercise. It is an ongoing process, there may be individual strategic agendas required for specific plans/departments/groups that work within the framework of the overall organizational Strategic Plan. You may need to adjust your vision based upon changing circumstances or environmental obstacles. “Oh Bother,” proclaimed Winnie the Pooh when faced with unanticipated obstacles. Not you, because your mastery of Strategic Planning has given you the confidence in knowing that remaining focused on the end results grants you the ability to prioritize as needed to achieve your successful outcome!