Strategic plans are often created in management-restricted environments and are relegated to the pressure of daily needs and market trends until the next planning cycle begins.
The strategy creates a common understanding of what the organization wants to achieve andor what you need to do for it. Strategic plans bridge the gap between that aspiration and the specific projects and daily actions that, ultimately as the sum of all of them, respond to the strategy.
Executing strategic plans often takes too long and has a higher associated cost than originally anticipated. In fact, only 8% of strategic leaders report a 90% or higher success rate on long-term strategic initiatives.
A well-defined strategic plan translates the business strategy into specific initiatives and actions that create a clear roadmap to execute and meet business objectives.
Using simple tools and templates, functional leaders can map and communicate their priorities on a page or two and make it easier for everyone to understand why and how to execute the plan across all team members according to role thereof.
Strategic planning is usually of four types of and all three levels. It usually starts at the organization level, and then turns into actions.
The three levels of strategic planning generally refer to business unit versus corporate and functional. The four types of plans are usually strategic, operational, tactical, and contingency.
For this, three essential factors must be taken into account when the plan is carried out: ambition, situation and adaptive capacity.
Ambition
First, establish a clear link between the strategy and the plan.
It's easy to confuse the essence of strategy with a detailed strategic plan, especially when conditions are changing rapidly and the horizon for change is short, but task number one is knowing the difference and why it matters.
- La digital workplace strategy defines the organization's long-term direction, articulating what it will do to compete and succeed in its chosen markets or achieve its mission.
- The Strategic plans define how your long-term ambitions will be realized. The functional strategic plans they define the roadmap of initiatives and the investment portfolio necessary to achieve those objectives. In them, the functional leaders document the options and actions necessary for the function to fulfill its contribution to the model and the objectives.
- The operational plans they address the execution of specific projects and changes, as well as any operational tasks that are not included in the plan.
This means creating strategic frameworks focused only on the material. Focusing on critical assumptions, relevant metrics, and the key initiatives each function needs to effectively contribute to organizational goals, even as they change.
Situation
Analyze the key trends and changing factors of the market.
It is essential to analyze and respond to trends that could affect the strategy and therefore the plan, and for which it is necessary to make and anticipate strategic working assumptions.
Ignoring or undervaluing these distortion or discontinuity factors, in the short or long term, produces critical gaps in the planning process, as well as a large opportunity cost, since it overlooks the threats and new opportunities for the value proposition and competitive positioning.
Different surveys show that in a range around only 38% of organizations have a formal process for this type of trend detection. The seven key areas of trends driving change are specified in another article on this blog, and to reinforce the interconnected nature of these factors (TPESTRE).
Any team leader can use this TPESTRE model to identify key trends to build strategic assumptions as they begin to map what actions might be needed in terms of business models, people, their capabilities, and information systems.
adaptive capacity
The faster the changes in operating conditions and market situation that are required to be integrated into the long-term strategy, the more adaptable the strategy models must be.
Un adaptive strategy approach It is what ensures that the organization can detect new opportunities earlier and respond more quickly than its competitors, which increases the chances of having in a world with uncertainties and dynamic changes.
Such an approach is based on four practices designed to shift the company from a rigid, top-down, schedule-driven process to a more change-driven, event-driven approach to strategy.
- start execution as soon as possible.
- Respond to changes as they are produced.
- Zoom in and explore the uncertainties.
- Involve to the entire organization, customers and third parties in the strategy.
Other key factors
An effective strategic plan helps organizational leaders improve focus and responsiveness to planning activities critical to achieving long-term goals. In addition, it allows, before a global vision, to establish the appropriate frameworks to focus the teams on the most critical issues.
To build a plan to ensure success with a robust and sequential process, functional leaders must:
- Ensure consistent use of terms to minimize confusion in strategic planning and establish a baseline for collaboration.
- Build a solid foundation for more detailed planning by establishing or testing the mission, vision, and goal statement before execution begins.
- Streamline stakeholder input by limiting mission, vision, and goal setting to senior management, and leaving the development of goals, action plans, measures, and metrics to managers with execution experience.
Every organization has some key aspects that must be respected when creating the plan and associated activities: Mission, Vision, Goals, Objectives, Action Plan and Measures or metrics.
Two aspects of those mentioned above should be highlighted. The strategic action plan which is a formal document and main source of information on how the objectives will be executed, monitored, controlled and closed. Sometimes organizations also include an associated but separate "action plan" to achieve the operating model.
On the other hand the measures they are observable results that allow evaluating the effectiveness of the action plans. The metrics quantify observed changes to allow objective quantification of progress and alignment with chosen measures.
