Strategic Planning

A Pragmatic Approach

J Blair, Consulting

Counsel to Management

THE PLANNER

ARE YOU READY?

START FROM WHERE YOU ARE

"LEVERS AND VALVES"

THE RIGHT TARGETS

THE RIGHT WORK

THE RIGHT IMPLEMENTATION STRUCTURE

Planning:  the organized search for the right work

What are we going to do?

Why are we going to do that?

What will it cost?

When will it be done?

Answering those four questions is the essence of strategic planning.  Rather than becoming entangled in elaborate strategies or eloquent mission statements, the effective executive planner needs to find the right work for the organization to do.

Strategies and missions (along with a variety of other items to define a planning context) have a place in strategic planning but as supporting elements, not as the leading characters.  In fact, nearly all of the usual attributes of planning are factors leading to the reasons why we choose a particular

"Work" answers the question:  "What are you going to do?"

Targets (mission, vision, values, goals, objectives, strategies, solving problems . . .) provide the answers to "Why should we do that particular work?"

"Work" definition provides the basis for answering:

• "How much will it cost?"

• "When will it be done?"

Planning is the organized search for the right work.  To plan, we need a set of targets, a set of projects which might move the enterprise towards the targets and ways to test proposed work against those targets.  Searching through various work alternatives (projects) to find those few most effective initiatives is the essence of planning.