Introduction to Strategic Planning

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Introduction to Strategic Planning

• June, 2007
• NC-DOC
• Capacity Building Training

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Agenda

• Welcome Introduction
• What is Strategic Planning?
• Who Plans?
• Conducting a Strategic Plan
• Vision, Mission Values
• Environmental Scan
• SWOT Analysis
• Action Planning
• Writing the Plan
• Evaluating the Plan
• Question Answer

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What is Strategic Planning?

• Strategic Planning determines where an
  organization is going over the next year or more,
  how it is going to get there and how it will know
  if it achieved its goals.
• Strategic planning serves a variety of purposes
  in organization, including to
• Clearly define the purpose of the organization
  and to establish realistic goals and objectives
  consistent with that mission in a defined time
  frame within the organizations capacity for
  implementation.
• Communicate those goals and objectives to the
  organizations constituents.
• Develop a sense of ownership of the plan.
• Ensure the most effective use is made of the
  organizations resources by focusing the
  resources on the key priorities.
• Provide a base from which progress can be
  measured and establish a mechanism for informed
  change when needed.
• Bring together of everyones best and most
  reasoned efforts have important value in building
  a consensus about where an organization is going.
• Provides clearer focus of organization, producing
  more efficiency and effectiveness
• Bridges staff and board of directors (in the case
  of corporations)
• Builds strong teams in the board and the staff
  (in the case of corporations)
• Provides the glue that keeps the board together
  (in the case of corporations)
• Produces great satisfaction among planners around
  a common vision
• Increases productivity from increased efficiency
  and effectiveness
• Solves major problems

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Who Plans?

• The chief executive and board chair should be
  included in the planning group, and should drive
  development and implementation of the plan.
• Establish clear guidelines for membership, for
  example, those directly involved in planning,
  those who will provide key information to the
  process, those who will review the plan document,
  those who will authorize the document, etc.
• A primary responsibility of a board of directors
  is strategic planning to effectively lead the
  organization. Therefore, insist that the board be
  strongly involved in planning, often including
  assigning a planning committee (often, the same
  as the executive committee).
• Ask if the board membership is representative of
  the organizations clientele and community, and
  if they are not, the organization may want to
  involve more representation in planning. If the
  board chair or chief executive balks at including
  more of the board members in planning, then the
  chief executive and/or board chair needs to
  seriously consider how serious the organization
  is about strategic planning!
• Always include in the group, at least one person
  who ultimately has authority to make strategic
  decisions, for example, to select which goals
  will be achieved and how.
• Ensure that as many stakeholders as possible are
  involved in the planning process.
• Involve at least those who are responsible for
  composing and implementing the plan.
• Involve someone to administrate the process,
  including arranging meetings, helping to record
  key information, helping with flipcharts,
  monitoring status of pre-work, etc.

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Conducting a Strategic Plan
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Vision, Mission Values

• Developing a Vision Statement
• The vision statement includes vivid description
  of the organization as it effectively carries out
  its operations.
• Developing the vision can be the most enjoyable
  part of planning, but the part where time easily
  gets away from you.
• the vision has become more of a motivational
  tool, too often including highly idealistic
  phrasing and activities which the organization
  cannot realistically aspire.
• Developing a Mission Statement
• The mission statement describes the overall
  purpose of the organization.
• When wording the mission statement, consider the
  organization's products, services, markets,
  values, and concern for public image, and maybe
  priorities of activities for survival.
• Consider any changes that may be needed in
  wording of the mission statement because of any
  new suggested strategies during a recent
  strategic planning process.
• Ensure that wording of the mission is to the
  extent that management and employees can infer
  some order of priorities in how products and
  services are delivered.
• When refining the mission, a useful exercise is
  to add or delete a word from the mission to
  realize the change in scope of the mission
  statement and assess how concise is its wording.
• Does the mission statement include sufficient
  description that the statement clearly separates
  the mission of the organization from other
  organizations?
• Developing a Values Statement
• Values represent the core priorities in the
  organizations culture, including what drives
  members priorities and how they truly act in the
  organization, etc. Values are increasingly
  important in strategic planning.
• Establish four to six core values from which the
  organization would like to operate. Consider
  values of customers, shareholders, employees and
  the community.

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Environmental Scan

• An environmental scan is conducted to collect
  data to answer questions about the present and
  future of the service area.
• The environmental scan
• develops a common perception.
• identifies strengths, weaknesses, trends and
  conditions.
• draws on internal and external information.
• is a key on-going process for internal and
  external honesty and openness to changing
  conditions.
• Tools for Environmental Scanning
• Surveys
• Questionnaires
• Focus Groups
• Open Forums

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SWOT Analysis
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Action Planning

• Developing Action Plans (or Work Plans)
• Actions plans specify the actions needed to
  address each of the top organizational issues and
  to reach each of the associated goals, who will
  complete each action and according to what
  timeline.
• Develop an overall, top-level action plan that
  depicts how each strategic goal will be reached.
• Develop an action plan for each major function in
  the organization, e.g., marketing, development,
  finance, personnel, and for each program/service,
  etc.
• Ensure each manager (and, ideally each employee)
  has an action plan that contributes to the
  overall.
• The format of the action plan depends on the
  nature and needs of the organization. The plan
  for the organization, each major function, each
  manager and each employee, might specify a) The
  goal(s) that are to be accomplished b) How each
  goal contributes to the organization's overall
  strategic goals c) What specific results (or
  objectives) much be accomplished that, in total,
  reach the goal of the organization d) How those
  results will be achieved e) When the results
  will be achieved (or timelines for each
  objective)
• Developing Objectives and Timelines
• Objectives are specific, measurable results
  produced while implementing strategies.
• While identifying objectives, keep asking Are
  you sure you can do this?
• Integrate the current years objectives as
  performance criteria in each implementers job
  description and performance review.
• Remember that objectives and their timelines are
  only guidelines, not rules set in stone. They can
  be deviated from, but deviations should be
  understood and explained.

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Writing the Plan

• Writing the Plan
• Have a small number of people write the first
  draft of the plan. An outside facilitator
  (someone hired from outside of the organization
  to facilitate the planning process) should not be
  the one who writes the plan.
• Dont worry about having every last detail in the
  first draft.
• The draft should be presented to the board of
  directors (if applicable) and upper management
  for review and approval. It's not unusual for the
  board and/or top management of large
  organizations to provide major input primarily to
  the contents in the body of the document, that
  is, the mission and vision and values statements,
  and the goals and strategies. Employees and other
  staff often provide the major input to the action
  planning portion, including the objectives,
  responsibilities and timelines for completion of
  objectives.
• Format of the Plan
• 1) Executive Summary -- This is written to the
  scope and level of content that an outsider can
  read the summary and grasp the mission of the
  organization, its overall major issues and goals,
  and key strategies to reach the goals 2)
  Authorization -- This page includes all of the
  necessary signatures from the board of directors
  (if applicable) and other top management
  designating that they approve the contents of,
  and support implementation of, the plan3)
  Organizational Description -- This section
  describes, for example, the beginnings and
  history of the organization, its major products
  and services, highlights and accomplishments
  during the history of organization, etc. 4)
  Mission, Vision and Values Statements -- These
  statements describe the strategic "philosophy" of
  the organization5) Goals and Strategies -- Lists
  all of the major strategic goals and associated
  strategies identified during the strategic
  planning process.
• Appendices(The appendices often include
  information that is somewhat confidential,
  detail-oriented and/or tends to change a lot.)
• A) Action Planning -- Specifies objectives,
  responsibilities and timelines for completion of
  objectivesB) Description of Strategic Planning
  Process Used -- Describes the process used to
  develop the plan, who was involved, the number of
  meetings, any major lessons learned to improve
  planning the next time around, etc.C) Strategic
  Analysis Data -- Includes information generated
  during the external analysis (for example,
  environmental scan) and internal analysis (for
  example, SWOT analysis), and includes listing of
  strategic issues identified during the these
  analysesD) Goals for Board and Chief Executive
  Officer -- Goals of the board and CEO should be
  directly aligned with goals identified during
  strategic planning. This appendix will list goals
  for the board and can include recommendations for
  redesigning board committees to be associated
  with strategic goals. The appendix also lists
  goals for the CEO goals -- these can be used
  (along with the CEO job description) to form the
  basis for performance evaluations of the CEO.E)
  Budget Planning -- Depicts the resources and
  funding needed to obtain and use the resources
  needed to achieve the strategic goals. Budgets
  are often depicted for each year of the term of
  the strategic planF) Operating Plan -- Describes
  the major goals and activities to be accomplished
  over the coming fiscal year.G) Financial Reports
  -- Includes last year's budget (with estimated
  expenses and the actual amounts spent), this
  year's current budget (again with estimated
  amounts and actual amounts spent), a balance
  sheet (or in the case of nonprofits, a statement
  of financial position), income statement (or in
  the case of nonprofit, a statement of financial
  activities), etc. H) Monitoring and Evaluation
  of Plan -- Include criteria for monitoring and
  evaluation, and the responsibilities and
  frequencies of monitoring the implementation of
  the planI) Communication of Plan -- Describe the
  actions that will be taken to communicate the
  plan and/or portions of it, and to whom

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Evaluating the Plan

• Key Questions While Monitoring and Evaluating
  Status of Implementation of the Plan
• Are goals and objectives being achieved or not?
  If they are, then acknowledge, reward and
  communicate the progress. If not, then consider
  the following questions.
• Will the goals be achieved according to the
  timelines specified in the plan? If not, then
  why?
• Should the deadlines for completion be changed
  (be careful about making these changes -- know
  why efforts are behind schedule before times are
  changed)?
• Do personnel have adequate resources (money,
  equipment, facilities, training, etc.) to achieve
  the goals?
• Are the goals and objectives still realistic?
• Should priorities be changed to put more focus on
  achieving the goals?
• Should the goals be changed (be careful about
  making these changes -- know why efforts are not
  achieving the goals before changing the goals)?
• What can be learned from our monitoring and
  evaluation in order to improve future planning
  activities and also to improve future monitoring
  and evaluation efforts?
• Frequency of Monitoring and Evaluation
• The frequency of reviews depends on the nature of
  the organization and the environment in which it
  is operating. Organizations experiencing rapid
  change from inside and/or outside the
  organization may want to monitor implementation
  of the plan at least on a monthly basis.
• Boards of directors should see status of
  implementation at least on a quarterly basis.
• Chief executives should see status at least on a
  monthly basis.

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Questions Answers