Five tips for outstanding strategies

However, before we start, we need to be a little cautious, as the word ‘strategic’ is one of the most abused adjectives in the management vocabulary.

You will often hear phrases like ‘let’s be more strategic’, but what does it actually mean? Taking a few moments to explore the vocabulary will save you and others unnecessary heartache and increase your chances of getting a great result.

I see the word ‘strategic’ as meaning the capacity to develop multiple choices and perspectives based on known and unknown events. I do not see visioning and environmental scanning as the only conversations you would have in a strategic planning process.

Depending on your business, there are many other things you may have to explore such as developing know-how, communication with stakeholders, and ensuring you have the clout and ability to measure performance.

Having conducted many strategic thinking discussions, here are my top five tips:

Be clear about your context 

Take time to describe why you want to undertake strategic planning. A personalised email describing the hopes and aspirations for the planning process is a great start. A short narrative on the current business situation will help crystallise thinking before people start the process.

Invite each participant to think more wholistically than his or her existing functional responsibility. If you have people turning up and they only want to protect their jobs and not to think expansively, the process will struggle. 

Engagement is everything

The right level and range of leadership and ‘decision making’ is essential. The process must have the right clout and depth of thinking to produce the legitimacy and urgency you need. You should approach a strategic planning process like it is a ‘think tank’.

Spend time upfront to build teamwork. Learn from past attempts and then act on the advice. There is no point reproducing the same ‘old’ and ‘tired’ strategic plan.

Surprise them

People hate wasting their time. Surprise them with fun and practical processes. Rotate people between activities and consider key questions in advance.

Use flash disks and simple softcopy templates on laptops to fast-track the turnaround of work in progress. Avoid death by PowerPoint and do not smother people with needless report-back sessions with volumes of flipchart paper. Keep things moving and interesting.

Time for reflection

If your agenda is too ambitious, you will not have the depth you need to generate clever strategies. Ensure certain individuals do not dominate and have a process that values constructive and helpful dialogue.

A good facilitator or chair is essential. Depending on the power relationships and politics, questions in advance can help but experience tells me that managers often do not do pre-planning activities.

Smart ‘follow up’

You need a project manager who will drive the production of the plans with key milestones in mind. Scheduling a recall session to review the plan is also a good idea. Most of all, consider how you will celebrate the completion of the plan and then how you will consult your stakeholders.

Supplement your plan with a communication strategy that details how you will ‘roll out’ the key messages and how each person will be involved in the future.

To learn more about Alastair Rylatt’s track record as a facilitator, guest presenter and trainer, visit  www.alastairrylatt.com