Simplified Strategic Planning Model
Posted: Tuesday, August 28, 2007
by Ian Pratt
What Makes A Good Leader
Action and Results FocusedIn the last 20 years, the author seen many strategic planning exercises that resulted in little more than the creation of a lengthy document. With the help of some further research, the author has identified some compelling statistics about strategic planning
- Greater than 80% of actions that result from a strategic planning exercise do not address the issues identified in the strategic analysis or SWOT analysis.
- 80% of strategic plans are not used again until the next strategic planning exercise
- In small business the strategy tends to reside in the mind of the CEO/owner
Why? There are many reason, including
- Many people push their own agendas in strategic planning sessions, rather than being analytical and focused on what is best for the business, resulting in a misalignment between the strategic analysis and the resulting actions.
- It is hard to get your head around the significant amount of research in a traditional strategic planning document.
- Managers often lack the leadership skills of execution – delivery of the plan
- After the two or three day strategic planning workshop it is back to the day-to-day operational activities and the plan gets forgotten
Intelligent design is the art of making complex things simple; this intelligent simplicity resonates in the heart of the basic strategic planning model.
The 3 ways for you to benefit from the use of the basic strategic planning model
- Simplified documentation of your analysis making it easy to review and grasp the key strategic issues your business faces.
- Prioritisation of issues to select only the most critical
- Penchant for action and results
The basic strategic planning model tends to appeal to two groups of people
- managers in large organisations who are constrained by corporate strategy, and
- small business operators who cannot justify the time or cost of producing a lengthy strategic planning document.
Basic Strategic Planning Model Guide
The basic strategic planning model eliminates the unnecessary paperwork and the duplicated analysis that traditionally occurs in large organisations. With this model, you will use your planning time wisely, only doing the things that add value.
All of the benefits in half of the time!
Do you see any value in stating the following in your strategic plan?
If interest rates go up, interest expense on borrowings will increase reducing the availability of cash for other activities!To complete a basic strategic plan we focus on the things that matter the most to your business. We do this by completing a targeted SWOT analysis.
Anyone running their own business or in a management position knows this, Why state the obvious in your plan?
A SWOT analysis is a list of your businesses strengths and weaknesses compared to your competitors and the external opportunities and threats that your business faces.
Use your Existing Knowledge
The SWOT analysis is simply a technique that assists you to structure your existing knowledge into a format that allows you to identify areas of priority for your business.
To get started divide an A4 piece of paper into 4 quadrants, and write one heading at the top of each quadrant, strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats.
Special Considerations
Consideration should be given to
- Customers/suppliers are they moving, growing or shrinking?
- Government, is the government looking to make changes that affect your industry? (Regulation or deregulation)
- Economic outlook, what is the economic outlook for your country and the country where you sell your products?
- Environment, are your products acceptable by future environmental standards?
- If you are in business you will need to be talking to your customers and suppliers ask them about your competitors, you will be surprised what you will learn.
- how happy they are with your service and what plans they have for the future.
The best strategic thinkers the author knows are small business owners with no tertiary eduction. Put your thoughts on paper identifying your
- Internal (in your business)
- Strengths (what are you good at?)
- Weaknesses (What do your competitors do better than you do?)
- External
- Opportunities, (where can you grow your business?)
- Threats (What will stop you growing?)
- Internal customers and suppliers
- External customers and suppliers
- Peers, staff and manager
Take Action for Results!
You want to use the basic strategic planning module because you have a penchant for action. List actions to respond to your SWOT and post them somewhere prominent in your business, where you will be reminded of them.
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