Why most Strategic Plans are little more than wish-lists
In fact I’ll go one step further and say that many Strategic Plans are DELIBERATE methods for NOT Progressing. In far too many organisations, the process of Strategic Planning is about compliance to a process of ‘having a plan’ and typically it has nothing to do with achievement of the outcomes listed in the Strategic Plan. They are at best a wishlist of hoped for outcomes. More often however they are used to hide a major lack of accountability and progress
Now I say this having reviewed hundreds of organisational Strategic Plans from multinational entities, Federal and State Government agencies, owner run businesses and not for profit organisations. I make the claim based on working with and training over three hundred different entities in Strategic Planning workshops, Board facilitation of strategy development, and delivering Strategy sessions to senior management groups.
And here is how it works for the ‘wish-list’ approach: The planning is mandated by an external entity (compliance requirement); the format is typically pro-forma fill in the blanks; the content is based mostly on a continuation of last year; and the information around available resources is scant. In this light, the entity will put together something that looks a lot like the last Strategic Plan, and fill it with high end statements about hopes for the future. This is the ‘we do it because we have to do it’ approach.
And lacking in a clear understanding of resources and capabilities, it will fail.
Other organisations are far more structured. In these organisations the purpose of a Strategic Plan is to distract or misdirect the workforce, management team or stakeholders from the real task at hand – to do whatever appeals to certain parts of the organisation regardless of potential. These Strategic Plans normally rely on a Strategic Planning team or Unit that asks division to respond to key planning criteria. But no single unit will understand what other units are doing, want to do or would like to do. No other unit will understand or be part of a shared outcome. And no single division will be held accountable to the Strategic Plan outcomes. This is the ‘more of the same, ask no questions’ approach.
And lacking in shared vision and stuck in silos, it will fail
The implications should not be downplayed – if you make a statement of intention in any form, a failure to act or initiate action towards that intention will nag away at you both consciously and unconscously. It will become a distraction; it will eat away at your focus; it will remind you at all sorts of unusual times. It’ll be the rust eating away at your foundations.
And yet the solution is surprisingly simple – DO! But to Do! well you need accountability to intentions and you need to monitor progress weekly, not quarterly. You need to be able to articulate your Off-Track and ON-Track signals of progress IN ADVANCE. And that requires you to think about where you are headed, why and what might emerge along the way.
Improved Monitoring and Accountability leads to one stunning outcome – you can Often Do Less, yet Achieve more
If you’ve seen any of the media campaigns for the Australian Federal Election you could have come to the following conclusions: Julia Gillard had a fixation with hand getsures; Tony Abbott had a fixation on Boats; and the Greens had the best Television Commercial not only of this campaign but of any other they’ve had…
Read More >If you’ve been following any of the mainstream media election coverage here in Australia (stuff in the usual papers, radio and TV programs) you’ve no doubt got a good understanding of what is going to happen on election day. The mainstream media synopsis thus far is that a) Julia Gillard got off to a good…
Read More >This great little cartoon/graphic says it all and although looking at the subject of Universities, there is much that we can all learn Here’s the Graphic. If your website spends all its time talking about you, and no time talking about the customer, how do you think your customers (and prospective customers) feel? I…
Read More >A series of recent activities has me writing on the idea of ‘future strategy’ and how different organisations are approaching their future development. What is interesting is the strong sense that preparing for your potential future requires multiple paths forward, not a single ‘home run’. To that end I’ve recently considered sporting bodies and local…
Read More >Stephen Downes is one the handful of bloggers I follow consistently. I do so because Downes (unlike many others unfortunately) like to write about his thinking AS WELL AS promoting the thinking of others, whether or not he agrees with them. In that way you get a solid collection of alternative views within his field…
Read More >Coming off what has been undoubtedly my busiest period (3 months) in the past decade, I’m in the throws of catching up on some light reading. I usually have at least two books on the go and my preference is for the books to be about diverse topics because it allows the mind to seek…
Read More >Every now and again you have an opportunity to listen to some rare insights to an industry sector. These opportunities are typically rare because the insights need to come from someone who not only ‘knows their stuff’, they need to be able to translate their knowledge in a way that the average person in the…
Read More >The ‘Supertax’ debate is an interesting one and as expected, both parties are heavily invested in their own outcomes. One thing the Mining Companies understand is that the tax will lower the size of their profits in boom times for the resources sector – they’ll still be raking in billions, its just that some of…
Read More >As more organisations look to gain an understanding of how to both identify and prepare for their potential and desired futures, Design Thinking is on the current radar screen as a skill set likely to provide significant value. On the 25th to 27th of may you can attend a highly interactive and practical conference on…
Read More >One of the current affairs TV programs did a story recently on the efforts by NSW police to crack down on ‘hoon’ drivers through a specific squad targeting them. The Victorian Police recently announced a similar project with the squad headed up by one of Victoria Police’s most effective senior officers, Inspector Bernie Rankin. Unusually…
Read More >