Strategic Planning

OVERVIEW:

Prior to beginning the strategic planning process, participants will be asked to complete background readings designed to help them focus on the need for and critical importance of strategic planning. The intense intellectual and emotional energy requires adequate preparation. Developing strategic thinking mind-sets provides valuable preparation with particular emphasis on how to:

• Become more open to ideas and perspectives
• Recognize broad implications of strategic issues
• Apply non-evaluative listening skills
• Consider customer in-put in the strategic planning process by recognizing and understanding the value of relational stakeholders
• Incorporate strategic issues into decision making
• Balance long-term strategic issues and goals with short term priorities

We highly recommend the use of collaborative technology for this process. Using lap-tops, participants simultaneously in-put their responses. Answers appear on a large screen almost instantaneously. This approach provides an exciting and dynamic method to what may otherwise be a tedious undertaking.

OBJECTIVES:

As a result of participating in this intensive organizational development initiative, participants will be able to:

• Understand exactly what a strategic plan is and the key components of strategic planning
• Distinguish between inputs, outputs, and outcomes, mission, vision, values, goals, guiding principles, objectives, and performance needs
• Know how to utilize a strategic plan for mission alignment and for coaching for performance excellence
• Conduct environmental scanning with particular emphasis on customers and stakeholders
• Complete strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and treats analysis
• Determine monitoring, measuring results, control, reporting, implementation, budget, preparation, and delivery factors necessary for successful strategic planning