Session 1 - Benefits & Limitations

This is the first of a series on strategic planning – to appear about every three weeks –  for adaptation to your own organization. Our goal in presenting this series is to allow you sketch a template for your own organization's strategic plan.

Strategic planning is a powerful tool for laying out the template or roadmap for future success and should be in every manager's toolkit.

In this series we shall look at:

	What strategic planning is and is not
	Organizing the strategic planning process
	Who does it and how
	How long it takes
	End products
	Drafting and refining the plan
	Centrality of values, vision, mission & strategy
	Doing a SLOT situational analysis (strengths, limitations, opportunities, threats)
	Setting the strategic objectives (SO) which define the future state of the organization
	Developing strategic action plans (SAP’s) to lead to the achievement of these SO’s
	Communicating the completed plan to the organization
	Implementing and monitoring the plan
	Reviewing progress and revising the plan

WHAT IS STRATEGIC PLANNING?

Strategic planning is a disciplined, creative process for determining how to take your organization from where it is today to where you wish it to be in the future.

Strategic planning is fundamentally a decision making process, based on asking simple (but deep) questions, analyzing the range of answers, and choosing among them:

            What do we do?                        Where are we going?
            Where are we now?                   How will we get there?
            How did we get here?                When will we get there?
            Why are we in business?            What will it cost?

This process encompasses the entire spectrum of issues an organization faces, ranging from the big ones of who you are, what you do, and what your corporate values are to the smaller but equally important ones that connect the focus on the future with the work that must be performed soon to move the organization forward.
  

WHAT ARE ITS BENEFITS?

The benefits of strategic planning are manifold since it:

	Asks and answers questions of key importance to the organization
	Provides a framework for decision making throughout the organization
	Reveals and clarifies future opportunities and threats
	Sets specific objectives for achievement
	Provides a basis for measuring performance
	Drafting and refining the plan
	Serves as a channel of communication
	Develops a team which is focussed on the organization's future
	Provides managerial training

The above benefits can be encapsulated in a single statement: Strategic planning aligns the total organization – people, processes, and resources – with a clear, compelling, and desired future state.

WHAT ARE ITS LIMITATIONS?

While the benefits are manifold, unfortunately so so its limitations:

	The future is uncertain and might differ substantially from expectations on which parts of the plan may be built.
	There will be internal resistance to formal planning due to multiple factors: • Information flows, decision making, and power relationships will be perturbed. • Conflicts within organization are exposed. • Current operating problems tend to drive out long-term planning efforts. • There are risks and fears of failure. • New demands will be placed on managers and staff. • Most people wish to avoid uncertaint
	Planning is difficult, messy, hard work.
	Planning is expensive - in time and money.
	The completed plan limits choices and activities for the organization in the future.

"Strategic planning determines where your organization should be going so that all organizational efforts can be pointed in that direction." (Below, Morrisey & Acomb)

            IS                                          IS NOT

            Human-based                           Process-based
            People's minds                         Set of rules
            Principles                                 Platitudes
            Collective vision                        Personal vision
            Commitment to planning            Commitment to plan
            Done by executives                   Done by planners
            Risk enhancer                           Risk eliminator
            Decision oriented                      Task oriented
            Done in open                            Done behind closed doors
            Messy & controversial              Smooth & harmonious
            Proactive                                 Reactive
            Deliberate                                Quick
            Focused                                  Diffuse
            Way of life                              Single activity
            Roadmap to the future              Next year's business plan
            Creative                                  Mundane

Go to the full set of strategic planning sessions in this series.

Could you benefit from confidential strategic advice in your company?
Contact us.  We would be delighted to assist you.