Strategic Planning for Your Organization: Part 2: Perspective Before Planning

The mountaintop view is like no other view

Your organization does important work.  No, your organization does vital work.  Think of the people you and your organization serve.  Now, imagine how those people would be negatively affected if your organization ceased to exist tomorrow.  Of course, this would never happen, right?  Well, you hope not, but hoping is not a strategy, nor will it take you to places you need to go in order to serve those people who are relying on you.  Today, we are looking at the first of thirteen strategic planning principles, perspective before planning.

Perspective before planning.  Success is not necessarily indicative of health and the root cause of problems are not always as easy to identify as we would like to think.  You may be turning a profit, or your deliverables may be down for the 3^rd quarter in a row.  Whichever is your reality, the real question is not, “What is happening?”, it’s “Why is it happening?”  The answer to that question and so many other vital questions comes when you walk through a disciplined, strategic planning process.  That process begins with perspective. 

The story goes like this.  In the 1980’s, President Regan commission Tom Paterson, founder of the Paterson Center and many of the strategic planning tools and resources we use here at Lead Self Lead Others, to work with Chinese government officials to help open the Chinese economy up to the rest of the world. Now, by this time, Tom had already made a name for himself by effectively helping companies such as RCA and Disney move their corporate vision forward.  But as Tom worked with these people from this far Eastern culture, how noticed a stark contrast between their style and that of their Western counterparts, he was so accustomed to working with.  These people moved slowly.  They circled a problem.  They came at it from many different angles.  They did not rush suppositions and they certainly did not rush action plans.  As Tom would later put it, they just seemed to keep circling the mountain until they arrived at the top. 

So, as Tom saw it, we may have a problem here in the Western world.  Tom would say that when it comes to problem-solving and working toward success, we tend to have a very linear and very “short-game” mindset.  We want to identify the problem and get it solved ASAP.  After all, time is money, right?  Well, yes, but have you ever considered that you are wasting money by rushing your problem solving and vision building processes?  Is it possible that spending more time gaining perspective on where you’ve been and where you are will better inform your decisions on where you’re going?  It is possible and is, indeed, very true. 

Think of the difference between the view of a given landscape from the top of the mountain vs. the valley floor.  Now, think of the view of your organization’s landscape.  Have we been making important leadership decisions for our organization with the view from the valley floor?  I think many of us have.  What if we gained the proper perspective to get to the mountaintop view?  I think you can clearly see this would be an absolute game-changer. 

As a certified Lead Self Lead Others coach, I have the tools and the experience to help your team gain the proper perspective to make the informed leadership decisions that are so vital to your future success.  You must find the truth before it finds you.  Why not fill out our quick contact form and set up a call with me today.  I want to help you find that truth.

*Jason is a certified leadership and strategic planning coach with Lead Self Lead Others, in Tulsa, Oklahoma.  He is also a certified “StratOp” facilitator with the Paterson Center in Fort Collins, Colorado.

Strategic Planning: What It Is and Why You Want It

Your organization does important work.  No, your organization does vital work.  Think of the people you and your organization serve.  Now, imagine how those people would be negatively affected if your organization ceased to exist tomorrow.  Of course, this would never happen, right?  Well, you hope not, but hoping is not a strategy, nor will it take you to places you need to go in order to serve those people who are relying on you. 

I’ll make a bold statement.  Success is not necessarily indicative of health.  So, what if you’re turning a profit or if you’re servicing more people this quarter than last?  The real question is not, “What is happening?”, it’s “Why is it happening?”  The answer to that question and so many other vital questions comes when you walk through a disciplined, strategic planning process.  In this article, I’ll give you an overview of the thirteen core principles of strategic planning and tell you exactly why they are important to you.  In the coming months, I’ll unpack each of the thirteen principles in detail for you.

A brief overview of the 13 core principles of strategic planning:

1.     Perspective before planning.  Success, in and of itself, is not necessarily indicative of health.  Even if your organization is effective, you must know why.  Would you rather have the view from the valley or the mountain-top?  You must find the truth before it finds you.  To do so, you can use a variety of tools to face current and future truths.

2.     Seek Truth.  There are two types of truth you must seek - current and emerging.  You must face crucial and sometimes difficult conversations.  It’s not easy, but you can do it.  And, you always keep in mind that you’re attacking principles, not people.

3.     The team develops the plan.  Collective wisdom is better wisdom.  Everyone contributes.  In the strategic planning process, you need owners, not advocates.

4.     Facilitated vs. Prescribed.  I bring the process, you bring the content.  If you hire a strategic planning consultant who wants to tell you how to run your organization, fire them immediately.  You and your team already have the answers.  You just need someone with the expertise to draw those answers out for you.

5.     Seek breakthrough.  Horizontal vs. vertical.  Vertical alignment is when the decisions and strategy are set from the top and everyone below is expected to fall in line.   However, horizontal alignment is when strategies are set collectively by multiple representatives with the whole organization in mind.  Vertical alignment sucks energy from an organization, while horizontal creates synergy among departments and staff members.

6.     Planning.  You must develop an architecture of success; a unified master plan based on the organizational distinctives and goals.

7.     Action.  Unified implementation of the core plan through action initiative teams working to accomplish milestones and goals is the way to get it done.

8.     Structure.  Form follows function.  Structure follows the substance of the plan.  You’ll have to develop a structure for executing the unified plan through appropriate and timely decision-making.

9.     Management.  If you plan your work and work your plan, your plan will work. Effective management means managing the whole.  Strategic, operational and financial.

10.  Control.  You manage the plan through strategic control panels which are an integral part of the plan management process.

11.  Learning.  You will continuously improve through the elimination of everything which does not add value and stoking the fires of those pieces that do.  No more sideways energy.

12.  Renewal.  Change is inevitable.  Your management system must help renew and adapt to change constantly. 

13.  New organizational discipline.  Perspective, Plan, Execute, Renew.  It’s a process and you can trust this process.

So, why is this important to you and your organization?  Simple. Because those people we talked about above are waiting for you to bring the clarity, unity, focus, energy to the organization you lead, and they believe in.  You deserve this and so do they.

*Jason Fitch is a certified leadership and strategic planning coach with Lead Self Lead Others, in Tulsa, Oklahoma.  He is also a certified “StratOp” facilitator with the Paterson Center in Fort Collins, Colorado.