Strategic Planning is Leading
Over 16 years, we’ve heard many reasons why an organization created a strategic plan but didn’t implement it. Most of them sound reasonable, but in the end, they are insufficient. When I hear that an organization created a strategic plan and didn’t implement it, the first question that comes to my mind is “What got in leadership’s way?” And by leadership, I mean board members and staff jointly. Like the finesse of an energizing orchestra conductor, good strategic plans are living documents that shift and change with an organization’s needs. Rather than being obsolete tomes, they are meant to be dynamic and evolving guides relevant to the organization’s future. The commitment to using a strategic plan as an organizational guide is ultimately about leadership. Indeed, the process of developing, regularly refreshing and being guided by a strategic plan offers multifaceted leadership opportunities.
In the design phase of a strategic planning process, the first leadership opportunity is at the inception of the idea of developing a new strategic plan. We believe top-notch strategic planning is inclusive. That means involving board members and staff together in creative and stretching thinking that ultimately aligns the whole organization to move in the same direction. Another aspect of inclusivity from the beginning is reaching deeply into an organization to invite staff who may not commonly participate in this kind of planning activity. This invitation is a professional development opportunity. It encourages staff to contribute their ideas about the organization’s future and experience what happens in a productive teamwork process. In our experience, some of the richest and freshest ideas come from dedicated staff who are on the frontlines of an organization’s work daily.
The next leadership opportunity is appreciating the full range of talent and perspective that an inclusive group brings to planning conversations. One way for leaders to show this appreciation is offering a variety of options for staff to participate in the strategic planning process. For example, as part of connecting with the organization’s identity, at a staff meeting invite staff from all parts of the organization to share their own stories about delivering on the organization’s mission or living out its core operating values. Mission stories help affirm and reveal the organization’s deep purpose. They can also help explain or clarify core competencies or aspirations for new competencies that may become part of the organization’s new strategic direction.
During a whole strategic planning process, an essential role for leaders is co-creating expansive space for fresh thinking. There are a variety of ways to design a process with this expansive space in mind. For example, one way is for a leader to hold back their ideas to let the ideas of others come to the forefront, and then act as a catalyst to pull those ideas together.
A second way of encouraging inclusiveness and expanded thinking for the strategic plan is by forming cross-organizational workgroups that use one of three different approaches. One option is imagining alternative “what if” strategic scenarios. Another option is brainstorming different goals and proposing different ways of achieving them. A third option is bringing clarity to the organization’s most strategic challenges and generating different means of addressing them. The chosen strategic thinking approach(es) is a leadership decision when designing the strategic planning process.
One other important leadership consideration in the design phase is the approach to communicating about the process within the organization, and outside with partners and key supporters. By sharing information about the strategic planning process design from the beginning, and the results of the various strategic planning conversations, leaders build trust in the process and the emerging ideas. The more information that is shared about the process as it’s unfolding, the more time board members and staff have to get comfortable with stretch ideas. In this way, when there are decisions about what goes into the final strategic plan, there are few to no surprises, resulting in support rather than resistance.
Strategic planning is not just an exercise in deciding the direction of an organization, its goals, and its implementation plans. Strategic planning is an organizational leadership opportunity. Individually, every participant can influence the process with their positive mindset, willingness to listen to the ideas of others, and be thoughtful and creative about how to use those ideas in the plan. The opportunity for this kind of influence and support starts with a commitment from leadership to design an open and engaging planning experience.
We don’t like their sound, and guitar music is on the way out.
—Decca Recording Co. 1962, Rejecting the Beatles
Lessons in leadership often come when you least expect them. I helped a small growing organization orchestrate a process to stand up an executive team. Before this process, the Executive Director was driving nearly all the organization's decision-making herself. This approach no longer served the organization’s needs, and she wanted to invest in the next level of leadership. In the shift from orchestrating to implementing the restructuring, I also transitioned from consultant to coach. In changing my role, I asked more questions to support members of the new executive team embrace and own their new roles.
In one particular coaching call with one of the new executive team members, I offered the metaphor of conducting an orchestra for leading at the executive team level. The leader struggled with this idea. She said she had much too much to do to worry about being a conductor. In an email a few days later, she said she had all the experience to be a good leader, and she didn’t have the time to consider being a conductor or continue working with me. That was the last time I heard from her, and not long after, she left that organization.
There are many lessons from this conversation. One is that not every metaphor works for every leader. Another is that the shift from doing at the management level to guiding at the executive team level can be a significant adjustment. And a third lesson was planning, like the kind required before conducting, is not every leaders’ core competency and some leaders resist it. However, in the nearly 100 strategic planning processes, we have had the joy of facilitating, we have yet to see one where the most engaged leaders weren’t the most engaged conductors.
If you’ve participated in strategic planning, you know that a big part is gaining new perspectives. CEOs/Executive Directors can contribute to this discovery step in a variety of ways. One effective approach – especially for leaders who are new to their roles – is to go on a “listening tour.” During a “listening tour” leaders interview leaders from partner organizations as well as various leaders and other stakeholders who may not know their organization well, but who can bring new points of view. Another way is to read and summarize key industry reports. And still another way is to involve both board members and staff in a SOAR analysis. In this analysis, participants look inside and outside the organization to identify strengths, opportunities, aspirations, and results that could be possible. In looking at the organization environment through this appreciative lens, leaders can reframe limitations and challenges into opportunities for attention.
Once an organization makes strategic decisions about direction, goals, objectives and success measures, the next step is building an action implementation plan. This important for leaders to use to ensure the strategic plan is implemented and used to guide the organization. We recommend starting with a 12 to 18-month action plan and expanding it by a year annually through the life of the plan. Some organizations prefer to do action planning before the Board of Directors approves the strategic plan. It helps the organization develop an appreciation for the full cost of implementation and the capacity the organization needs to be successful. Other organizations prefer that the Board approve the plan in concept and then direct the staff to develop implementation plans based on available annual resources. The choice of approach often depends on organization history, aspirations of organization leaders and the strategic issues facing the organization. Again, an effective inclusive approach to action planning is to invite cross-organizational workgroups to develop the ideas for the action plans that they will ultimately be responsible for implementing.
In our experience, cross-functional workgroups are becoming increasingly popular for the value of the results they produce. While these workgroups have been in favor for quite a while, we often hear about the silos within organizations and the challenges these programmatic or departmental silos present. Herein lies another leadership opportunity because depending on the group composition, these groups need the support of a confident leader to encourage their work. Leaders often come to new workgroups with fears such as “Will I know enough, will I be accepted, and will anyone listen to me?” In fact, these fears can creep in any time in a planning process. Confident, trusting leaders can help mitigate these concerns, reframing these fears as opportunities to have new stretching experiences that build trust and confidence in emerging leaders.
Strategic planning is not just an exercise in deciding the direction of an organization, its goals, and its implementation plans. Strategic planning is an organizational leadership opportunity. Individually, every participant in the process can be influential with a positive mindset, willingness to listen and embrace others’ ideas, and be thoughtful and creative about how to use those ideas in the plan. Then, once the plan is adopted, success in implementing it comes from an array of staff and volunteer leaders motivating themselves, working collaboratively, and being agile enough to make adjustments in the plan over time.
When we hear that an organization developed a strategic plan and never implemented it, this raises two leadership questions. One question is: What happened in the strategic planning process that resulted in approving a plan the leaders weren’t excited and energized to implement? The second question is: What prevented leaders from using the approved plan as the organization’s guiding framework. The strategic choices leaders make are the difference between a strategic plan gathering dust on the shelf or using a strategic plan as the organization’s energizing guide.
I can do things you cannot, you can do things I cannot. Together we can do great things.
– Inspired by Mother Teresa