Strategic Planning: Street-Wise Tips to Make It Work for Your Organization

Strategic planning can be either a boon or a bust for an organization. Many people bring “baggage” to the process. Some people have had terrible experiences. They vehemently oppose committing time and other resources to it. Others yawn, glaze over and are completely skeptical that the process can produce any measurable results. Others enthusiastically embrace the process and produce extraordinary results.

What makes a strategic planning project successful? How can you get the most out of the time and money invested in the project? The following points address key factors that will help you take action to plan and implement a successful strategic planning project.

1. Invest time in “planning to plan.”

Get commitment from the CEO and senior management. Make sure that the CEO and senior management will be active participants. This means clearing their schedules to ensure attendance in all face-to-face strategic thinking sessions. Be sure they understand that the commitment of resources extends beyond face-to-face strategic thinking sessions. Resources, including time as well as money, must be committed to the implementation and measurement stages in order for the strategic plan to be successful.

Appoint a Project Planning Team. This team will usually consist of two to four people who are responsible for making decisions about the structure of the project and communicating with the others who will be involved.

Determine whether to use an internal or external facilitator. An external trainer enables all those involved to actively participate in the strategic thinking activities. It is extremely difficult for an internal person to facilitate and also express their personal insights as questions are raised. An external facilitator also offers “the third person” perspective, can bring information from other sources and challenge “entrenched in-house thinking” or “corporate taboos.” An external facilitator can manage the group’s participation without concern of the hierarchy, political consequences or personal repercussions.

Develop a clear statement of what you want to achieve. By clearly articulating what you want to accomplish, you improve your chances for success. Utilize the facilitator to help you. Communicate this statement to participants and other members of your organization.

Explore the benefits, drawbacks of a variety of formats with the facilitator.Work with the facilitator to select the format that best meets the unique needs of the organization and individuals involved. (Do you want to utilize pre-session activities conducted by electronic media/fax/mail to get participants thinking before the face-to-face sessions? Is there a need for market research? If so, what type and to what extent? What existing information is pertinent for the group to review? Should strategic thinking sessions be half-day, full-day, spread out over several months or condensed into several days back-to-back? Should the strategic thinking sessions be held on-site or off-site? What atmosphere is most conducive for the participants to leave behind the day-to-day pressures so they can fully concentrate on strategic thinking?)
2. Gain an understanding of the key elements of the process and the facilitator’s style. A comprehensive strategic planning project should include:

Conducting an Environmental Scan – This helps you understand the current environment that your organization operates within. It often includes market research in the form of surveys, focus groups or industries studies. It should include an analysis of the organization’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (SWOT.) It should identify the organization’s core competencies.

Developing or reaffirming of the organization’s Core Values, Mission and Vision.

Identifying and prioritizing the Key Strategic Issues/Directions.

Developing an Action Plan that includes goals, objectives, action steps, time lines and outcome measurement strategies.

Implementing the Action Plan.

Evaluating progress by how effectively you’ve met the outcome measurements.

Communicating the benefits of the strategic planning process to those who will be participating.
3. Conduct the strategic planning activities.

Work with the facilitator to determine the logistics of any pre-session activities. Determine how those activities will be conducted — by phone, email, fax or mail? Who will disburse the information? Who will gather the responses, compile and distribute summaries? Determine who is to be contacted?

Work with the facilitator to develop an agenda for any face-to face strategic thinking sessions.

Give the facilitator freedom to implement the process in the manner that works for him/her. Each facilitator has his/her own style. Allow them to utilize their style to maximize the results.

During the strategic thinking activities, allow the process to work the participants. Be on your guard for an individual or group of individuals who try to control or manipulate the process to achieve (or avoid) preconceived results. A good facilitator will minimize the chances of this happening, but support from the Project Planning Team can be very helpful.
4. Implement the action plan.

Implementing the action plan is essential to your overall success. Strategic planning is much more than merely the strategic thinking and strategy development. The essence of strategic planning is implementing the strategy, measuring the outcomes and adjusting your organization’s performance based upon the outcome measurements.

Use the strategic plan to guide day-to-day activity, budget development, research and development, etc.

Measure, measure, measure. Measure your progress by utilizing the outcome measurement strategies that are part of the action plan.
5. Review, re-evaluate and revise.

Review the strategic plan at least annually. Better yet, record progress quarterly. Then review the progress on an annual basis.

Re-evaluate the environment, core values, mission, vision and key strategic issues/directions. If these need to be revised, do so.

Revise as needed and develop a new action plan.

Make strategic planning an ongoing activity rather than one that is conducted every three or five years.
Strategic planning provides your organization with the foundation for sustainable growth. It helps you know where you want the organization to go and when you have achieved your goals. Strategic planning not only helps you manage change, but profit from change. It increases your control over those forces that affect you and helps you to respond more effectively to those forces that you cannot control. During these uncertain times, a successfully implemented strategic planning process can be the “guiding light” that helps employees and management manage and prosper from change.

2011 Center for Strategic Change, LLC. All Rights Reserved.

Judy Whalen is founder of Whalen & Associates, Inc. and the Center for Strategic Change, LLC. Judy has over 18 years of experience as a consultant to business and nonprofit leaders guiding them through strategic thinking sessions and developing strategic plans. The Center for Strategic Change provides consulting services in the areas of strategy, market research and communications. It also offers teleseminars, webinars, live workshops and a DVD series to help business and nonprofit leaders grow and sustain their organizations. Judy is also the founder of Strengthen the Harmony between Your Life, Family and Work to help individuals build harmony between their personal life, family life and business life.

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Are Non-Profits Prepared For Strategic Planning?

I wish I could count the number of times I have attended a non-profit strategic planning session, or discussed the need to have (or update) one in a board meeting, or been invited to serve as the facilitator. It has always – always – struck me that the strategic planning session should just be starting about the time that it is actually ending (e.g., too much time is wasted at the beginning and then a frenzy results at the end). The purpose of this article is to outline some observations over 30 years of strategic planning experience and to share suggestions that will improve the chances for a successful outcome.

Holding a Strategic Planning Session
At some point in time, every member of a non-profit board is going to hear the suggestion: “let’s hold a strategic planning session!” from a fellow board member or staff member. It’s not a bad idea but, unfortunately, it’s often a waste of time and produces no measurable outcomes. I want to share some observations and thoughts about strategic planning – invite debate – and see if we can come up with some guidelines that make the investment of time worthwhile. I have often said that strategic planning is a ‘process’ and not an ‘event’ – and I still very much believe that statement is true. However, maybe I should also add the caveat that a successful ‘process’ does indeed require an ‘event’ – or series of events – which is precisely the point. If you agree with my belief that the event often ends about the time it should be starting, then you would have to agree that additional follow-up after the event is required in order to create a meaningful strategic plan because the plan stopped short of completion during the original event. And a lot of time was used inefficiently, which also makes people reluctant to participate in the future.

A Working Document
Without a doubt, the primary way that I judge a successful strategic plan is by seeing a copy of it a year after the ‘event.’ If it’s a bit too dusty (which is often said in jest, but is true!) and if the pages are in pristine condition, then the event that created the plan was obviously not successful in motivating action. However, if the copy is dog-eared, marked up, added to, pages tagged, and otherwise well-used; then the event was super successful because a ‘process’ was indeed born and the need for ongoing action was instilled. In my opinion, successful outcomes are too rare in the strategic planning ‘implementation’ phase. The copy of the strategic plan that I described as a success is one that has become a working document, which is what planning is all about.

Defining ‘Strategic’
From an analytical standpoint, one way to define something is to determine what it is not. Strategy is different from ‘tactical’ or ‘operational’ (which is actually performing a task). Strategy is more subjective and cerebral; it involves thinking about an issue in broader terms than usual; thinking about circumstances that do not currently exist (i.e., future oriented) and determining how to adapt the organization to benefit from those predicted opportunities or avoid anticipated threats. Often, it involves thinking about an issue totally differently than ever before (which is VERY hard to do). Strategy development is not the same as operations implementation. For example, when I have been invited to ‘do’ strategic planning for an organization, I always ask if there is an Operating Plan; i.e., if you don’t know how to perform your core business every day (Operating Plan), why would you want to spend time working on a future-oriented process (Strategic Plan)? Strategy (highly subjective) is the opposite of operational (highly objective/defined/specific). Objective is ‘cut and dried’ – there is a procedure/process/outcome that arises from certain actions, done at certain times, in a certain way to produce known/certain outcomes. We already know if we do these certain things what we will get. Most people can adequately perform what they are taught/instructed. However, developing strategy – even the process of thinking about it – is very different. A strategic planning session led by a ‘doer’ instead of a ‘strategist’ and ‘critical thinker’ will yield disappointing results; however, ‘doers’ can be very helpful in participating in the development of strategy if they are properly guided. A couple of very simple examples of strategic vs. operational issues will make the point:

Funding
Operational – How are we going to make payroll next month?
Strategic – How do we need to adapt our operations to comply/excel with the recent changes for non-profits by Congress?

New Program
Operational – We need to add a new program to our existing series.
Strategic – We need to add a new series to cover new topics that will take our organization in a new direction.

Operating Plans Are Important
Let me be quick to tout the benefits of an Operating Plan. Properly executed, an Operating Planning Session can provide or refine specific guidance/clarification/policy on any number of day-to-day issues that really can be a big help when running the organization. The primary difference between strategic and operating (which is a huge difference) is that operating plans deal with the ‘here and now’ – with processes and policies that will improve the current business function – strategic plans, simply put, engage the participants in thought processes meant to challenge the current business function by looking into the future and assessing opportunities, threats, weaknesses, and strengths. A good Operating Plan can minimize daily confusion/questions about the manner in which specific job functions should be conducted. The ‘event’ of operations planning – getting the appropriate team together to discuss, debate, and decide the issues – is, in-of-itself, a very worthwhile team-building and clarifying session (if properly planned and executed). While Operating Plans are beyond the scope of this article, I wanted to make sure they were mentioned in a positive context.

The Mission Statement and The SWOT Analysis
Unfortunately, most strategic planning sessions seem to begin with either a review of the mission statement or a SWOT analysis. Both are usually ‘deal-busters’ in that they bog down the process of innovative thinking for strategic planning. For example, unless the core business of the organization has been totally disrupted (e.g., by lack of funding or policy, political, social, or technology changes), then the existing mission statement should be in reasonably good condition. To delve into the mission statement – and debate specific words and placement within the text – sucks the life out of the planning session and can often pit individuals against each other right from the start over silly things like wordsmithing. Not only is this unfortunate, but I would suggest that it is totally unnecessary. How can you revise a mission statement until you go through the rigors of the strategic planning process and determine whether or not there are bona-fide strategic issues worth pursuing? My preference is to hold the mission statement for a separate planning meeting after the strategic plan has at least been through an initial rough draft process. Perhaps a good analogy is to look at the mission statement from the back end – maybe it should be thought of as more of an executive summary?

Preparation For The Planning Session Is Critical
There is probably no exercise that requires more preparation than strategic planning. Why? Because the participants must be the right ones (those with authority and accountability), the purpose of the exercise must be made very clear (to stay ‘on point’ and eliminate confusion and fear), and the process must be known and engaging in advance (so participants can be prepared to contribute their very best). The most obvious difference between a private-sector strategic planning session and one for a non-profit organization is the inclusion of volunteers, namely the board of directors. The good news is that the planning session will include a diversity of opinion; the bad news is that most board members have probably been through some type of strategic planning before and have preconceived notions about the process based on their previous experiences (hence, the importance of preparing for the session in advance). I will discuss the dynamics of the volunteer participants in a later section.

I strongly recommend using an experienced professional outside facilitator (not a staff member, a board member, or a friend of a friend…) for at least three reasons:

(1) It is important to have 100% involvement of the entire board and staff members, so using participants to lead sessions or write on flip charts takes them out of the game.

(2) The selected facilitator must fully understand the main points presented in this article and have familiarity with applying them in actual planning sessions. (I will discuss some thoughts on selecting a facilitator in a later section.)

(3) You cannot be a prophet in your own land – your fellow board members and/or staff will resent you for being the strategic planning leader (even if you are experienced). Obtaining outside help eliminates this problem.

If possible, share copies of previous strategic plans (with the participants and the facilitator) as part of the preparation process that takes place well in advance of the event. Successful planning takes more time in preparation than it does in execution; this is a good rule of thumb to remember. If very little (or no) planning goes into the preparation, the participants will show up without direction and without having pondered creative solutions to some known issues to get their juices flowing; the event will likely be a disaster (and a waste of a lot of precious time).

Conducting The Advanced Preparation
Plenty of lead time is important; six months is not too long. Start by regularly discussing the need/desire of a strategic planning session at board and staff meetings. A letter to the board from the chair is a good way to officially announce that a strategic planning session is necessary. That letter should include a few examples of issues that are pressing the organization for strategic solutions. The board may wish to name a committee responsible for the planning (or, the board may already have a Strategic Planning Committee). Remembering that the plan is intended to be forward looking, it is important to involve up-and-coming board and staff members; their participation will be critical to the future implementation of the plan, so it is imperative they be involved in the development of it. Newer participants are often more reluctant to engage during the planning session because they conclude, perhaps rightly so, that there is a lot of history that they do not know. Remembering that strategic planning is forward looking, the facilitator must work hard to bring everybody into the dialogue because past history is less important than future strategy.

Let’s cover a few aspects of the advanced preparation checklist:

Participation
Remember that inviting the participants is easier than getting them to attend the session! This is one of the best reasons for beginning the discussions about the planning session six months in advance. My suggestion (this is a bit radical) is that it be made clear that if a participant cannot arrive on time and stay for the entire event, then they should not attend. This rule will make clear the importance of full participation. Reiterating this for several months prior to the session will make it less likely to have a misunderstanding on the day of the event. (If the organization is extremely proactive, then it already has a policy on board attendance and what is considered an excused absence.)

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