Strategic planning as a team has huge benefits, no matter what type of organisation you are – business, not-for-profit, social enterprise, volunteer group, government agency.
However, a strategic planning workshop can easily turn into a snooze-fest, a talk-fest, a mess of irrelevant tangents, or worse!
As a strategic planning facilitator, I know that planning sessions don’t have to be a dull, tick-the-box affair – they can be dynamic, fun, inspiring and well-informed.
I also see the same obstacles come up time and time again, that stop a group from doing its best work and coming up with a great strategic plan.
So here’s 5 tips to keep you and your team on track at your next strategic planning workshop and actually enjoy it!
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1. Set some pre-work for everyone who’s attending the strategic planning workshop.
Improve efficiency and encourage participation by getting everyone to do some individual pre-work before the strategic planning workshop. Some ideas:
- Ask attendees to review the previous strategic plan, so everyone is familiar with it before they arrive.
- Ask each person to brainstorm a list of strategic risks and strategic opportunities, and come prepared to share these in the workshop.
- Use focused and structured questions when sending out the pre-work, not general broad questions like ‘What do you think of X?’ This will help to keep your discussion at the workshop focused and on track.
2. Get everyone on the same page at the start of the strategic planning workshop.
Use the start of the workshop to make sure everyone is on the same page and answer any questions of clarification from the attendees. This is especially important if you have new Board members or there’s been a history of poor communication in the organisation (no judgement!)
Getting everyone up to speed at the start will save time in discussions later on. You’ll clear up any potential misunderstandings early on, and give people enough knowledge to fully participate throughout the session.
A good way to start the workshop is a brief overview from the Chair or CEO about how the organisation has performed against the previous strategic plan, and how they hope the new strategic plan will benefit the organisation. Then give attendees the opportunity to ask any questions of clarification.
If you’re using an external facilitator, ask them to collate the pre-work and bring the results to the workshop. This will reassure attendees that an independent person is overseeing the process, and it’s one less task on your own to-do list in the lead-up to the meeting.
3. Invite the right people to your strategic planning workshop.
Depending on the size and structure of your organisation, your strategic planning workshop might include:
- the Board or Management Committee only.
- the Board and the CEO.
- the Board, the CEO and senior managers.
- everyone in your organisation, if you’re a small team.
The upside of inviting everyone is that the more team members are involved in developing the strategic plan, the greater their sense of ownership, and the more knowledge and skills you have in the room to draw on.
The downside is that you may end up with a big and diverse group, which can be hard to manage without a facilitator. You may also be including people who have no interest in the strategic plan and don’t want to be there.
A good compromise is to put out an open call for feedback from interested staff or members before the strategic planning session. This feedback can then be taken to the strategic planning workshop with the Board and executives.
4. Don’t get stuck on wordsmithing the vision and mission statement.
A frequent cause of overly-long strategic planning sessions, and the hardest one to overcome – I’m still guilty of this myself!
The words you choose for your vision and/or mission ARE important. Never underestimate the power of words to motivate or disengage people. The vision and mission are also the foundation of your strategic plan – everything else flows from this, so it’s important to get it right.
However, you don’t want to spend the entire session on this at the expense of the other parts of the strategic plan. Try to get the vision/mission to a point where everyone is 80% – 90% happy with it. Then nominate a couple of people to go away and wordsmith a few different options for the others to review and comment on out of session.
5. Include small group work during the strategic planning workshop.
Splitting into pairs or small groups to work on tasks during the workshop is a great way to for people to get ‘hands on’ with the strategic plan, boosting their engagement and ownership.
Moving from the whole group to small groups is like a ‘change of scenery’, helping people to refresh their brains and allowing quieter people more airtime. It’s a great way for attendees to build on each other’s ideas and come up with the best input possible for the strategic plan.
You’ll need time for each small group to share their work with the bigger group, including an opportunity for discussion and input by all. A facilitator can help manage this process to ensure everyone gets a say, while keeping the workshop on time and on topic.
Try these tips in your next strategic planning session and watch your efficiency and engagement skyrocket!
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