Successful strategic planning is an ongoing process. It's meant to be constantly revised, evaluated, and put into action so that your team is always having productive, future-oriented discussions.
Most teams find it useful to conduct formal strategic planning at specific intervals. This is because developing a strategic plan requires a substantial organizational commitment. Planning your strategic actions at regular intervals can help you avoid procrastination.
At SME Strategy, we typically develop 3-year strategic plans because it balances the long range thinking as well as the short term execution. We then recommend an annual cadence of a full strategic plan review to make updates along the way.
Whether developing a new strategic plan or updating an existing one, key questions we ask include:
Where are we now? (Current State Analysis)
Where are we going? (Future State Analysis)
What might get in the way? (Risk Analysis)
What do we need to do to move that forward? (Goal Setting & Action Planning)
How are we going to communicate to implement and sustain the plan? (Plan execution)
Focusing on three year plans makes it more attainable and adaptive to the marketplace, and ultimately helps your organization to be more successful.
Learn more about integrating the strategic plan to daily operations