Strategic planning made simple (!)

Many people regard the challenge of developing a strategic plan with some trepidation. It’s a big task; there’s a lot of extra work involved; it involves high-powered techniques and high-level workshops. In fact, it’s often seen as hugely important, but something to be deferred until it can’t be put off any longer!

Of course, people’s understanding of what is involved is not helped by the fact that responsibility for developing the strategic plan is often designated to a special team, who then shut themselves away in the corporate ivory tower and undertake a mysterious process involving lots of charts and spreadsheets, two or three Board away-days – and a few months later produce a thick document full of appendices that sits proudly on the Chief Executive’s shelf for a few months then gradually gathers dust. An unfair stereotype perhaps – but sadly still too often at least partly true!

So, I thought it might be helpful to ‘demystify’ what goes into developing an effective strategic plan by breaking down the various activities involved.

First we need to prise apart the somewhat ungainly (and uninspiring) composite term ‘strategic planning’. (Considered literally, it begs the question what makes this particular type of planning ‘strategic’ – merely a longer time horizon, perhaps, or a ‘whole organisation’ perspective?)

For me, the words ‘strategising’ and ‘organising’ begin to express better the different types of work involved. ‘Strategising’ encompasses the art of working out how an organisation can best approach the future; ‘organising’ is the process of aligning and prioritising its resources to progress this.

And then there are the various activities that contribute to these. Strategic analysis investigates extensively, deeply and most importantly objectively where the organisation is in relation to its markets and environment, what its capabilities are, and how it can make a difference - gathering together relevant information and compiling a picture to inform discussion. Strategic insight is the understanding of why this is the case – as much synthesis and intuition as analysis. Formulating strategy is an art - it involves considering options and their implications, making decisions, and expressing the chosen direction and rationale clearly and succinctly.

Of course, these are not one-off sequential steps – it might take several iterations to come to conclusions that make sense, and to complete the decision-making process in the organisation. And there are three simple but vital activities that run through all of this: thinking, discussing and making decisions.

Organising is about planning – quantifying what the future might look like for the organisation, allocating resources, deciding on priorities, communicating and initiating actions, monitoring progress, and adjusting accordingly as the situation changes: a dynamic cycle of plan, act, monitor, adjust.

Implementing a strategic plan is how it becomes real. And when the organisational learning continues. A ‘live’ strategic plan acts as a guide – it sets out the direction of travel, and an indication of how the journey will be approached. An effective strategic planning process also ensures that the organisation understands the rationale for these – so it is better able to adapt as the situation changes.

So, strategic planning is really a combination of several processes, each utilising particular skills. Breaking it down like this can help an organisation to understand what is required at each stage of the ‘strategic planning journey’, and so make it more manageable. Understanding what is involved, and what stage you are at, makes the thinking and discussions much more effective.

No need for delegating this to the corporate ivory tower then – but an opportunity for everyone in the organisation to understand what strategic planning is really about, and to be involved.