Your Strategic Plan
As your career school goes through the strategic planning process, what components are included in its strategic plan? Which component do you believe is the most important to successful plan execution? Why?
Components included in a strategic plan are; direction statement, strategic objectives, priority issues, and action plans.
I believe that priority issues are the most important part of the strategic plan because they provide the why and the how of the startegic plan. According to the reading priority issue are "costs, service, new markets and products, geographic expansion, acquisitions, divestitures, orgganizational structure, core competencies and processes, new technology, training and development, and information systems". All of these components should be clarified in order to move forward.
Regarding core competencies for example, if the faculty of a school is competent in information techology and the school decides to expand into the culinary market with the existing staff, it won't matter if students are lined up at the door to enroll because the faculty is not prepared to instruct in the new program. A sure way to lose revenue and reputation.
Rebecca,
Nice work. You have hit on a couple of items that are really important to effective strategic planning. One of the real challenges of strategic planning is connecting these components effectively and continually ensuring alignment. Priority issues should be aligned with the organizations strategic objectives and executing against priority issues require well thought out action plans that align people with the strategic objectives and priority issues. Your point on new culinary program brings to light a common problem in organizations in that they often set new strategic objectives but fail to align the right people and action plan to execute against them.
What part of aligning these important components of the strategic planning process do you find most difficult?
Dr. Faulkner
I believe one of the most difficult components in aligning a strategic plan is timing. I'm working on a strategic plan to add a new program to the career college. With the addition of electronic medical records into our healthcare system by 2013, doctor's offices and hosptial's will need employees trained in the use of EMR's for a successful transition from paper records to paperless records.
The difficulty is do we take a chance and add the program based on speculative needs or do we wait and see what other schools are doing in the area. I believe if we wait we may miss the opportunity to become the leader in this niche market however, if we develop the program and there is no need, we have students with a degree they can't use. Timing is definitely difficult
An elderly and successful entrepreneur told me once that his successes were predicated on luck, good timing and good management teams. I think that sometimes that holds true in regards to introduction of new programming as well!! Your example is a good one and a common problem in our sector of education. I think that getting good input from advisory committees and also speaking to employers in other parts of the country that may be more progressive in certain industries is helpful in making decisions on timing for launching programs in emerging fields of employment.
Having a background in Corporate Culture, I truly believe that employees can "make or break" the success of any organization. Part of the Strategic Planning Process is the awareness of Senior Leadership of how important the Company's Culture is. If a cultural direction needs to be established or re-established it must take place prior to implementation. A company must have buy-in from its employees as to the overall mission, vision and objectives they all set-out to achieve. If this does not happen, employees can actually under-mind all efforts for success. Units need to be aware of culture and individual employee mind-set as part of their success planning.
Cheryl,
I believe you hit on a couple of extremely important points in your comments. I believe involving employees in the planning process is even more critical today then ever. There are so many external factors impacting higher education and the economy overall that people need a clear vision of where the organization is going and what it needs to do to get there. I believe honesty and continuing to include people in the process during difficult times is appreciated by employees and provides comfort that the organization has a plan on how to move forward. A collaborative corporate culture needs to remain inclusive during both good and bad times if it is to be effective over the long haul.
What is your background in corporate culture that you have mentioned?
First, Conduct a Gap Analysis to get crystal clear as to where you are today, and where you want to be at a specific time in the future, whether is 1 year to 10 years from now. This is your End Result. It may be in any given area: Revenue, Profits, Market Share, Innovation, Cash Flow, Cash Reserves, Expenses, Employee retention, Customer satisfaction, Repeat Customers. Most people kind-of know where they are, and have an idea where they want to be. Both of these need to be specific. This way you will have a benchmark of where you started, and will be able to gauge your progress. Wanting to “improve customer service†is not quantifiable. Having a customer satisfaction rating of 78 percent, and wanting to improve to 85 percent is quantifiable. This is paramount to the strategic planning process. The difference from where you are today, to where you want to be ( the End Result) is “the Gap†that you must close. Second, prepare a mission statement. In this component of the stategic planning process you develop the mission statement. It should at a minimum state Who must do What by When, Where, and Why. The “Why†is the Desired Outcome from the Gap Analysis. Third, conduct a SWOT analysis. You must objectively analysis your organizational Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. Fourth, develop the leader’s vision statement.
This is the most important component of the strategic planning process, for all time and will always be is The Leader’s Vision Statement. Because the vision of leadership permeates the workplace and is manifested in the actions, beliefs, values and goals of your organization’s leaders.
Juvenal,
You have identified some key components of the strategic planning process. I agree that part of the strategic planning process is determining your current reality and what you want that reality to be at set times moving forward. Clearly articulating the vision for the organization is also important. However, one of the key components of strategic planning that tends to be problematic is turning the strategic plan into action. Clearly identifying strategic objectives as well key action items with assigned leadership responsibility and follow-up to check on progress or adapt to changing conditions are critical components to executing on the strategic plan. The plan provides an overall "North Star" of where the organization is going and how it intends to get there but it is a dynamic document that is impacted by both internal and external changes so it must be reviewed periodically.
Are you at a school with multiple locations and if so how do you integrate your campus planning into the overall organizational strategic plan?
Dr. Blake Faulkner
I feel that the best way to have a successful strategic planning process with successful outcomes is to use the team approach. This process is made up of the following steps. 1. Get all of your team involved. 2. Develop a clear and concise direction statement. 3. Have well defined priority issues. 4. Develop very clear and well defined action steps leading up to the complete action plan. 5. Then make sure that the whole team believes in the process and the final strategic plan. I feel that all of the components to a strategic plan are equally as important. Failure to do one step could cause the process to fail. One step relies on the other and when all process steps are done correctly the end result is a successful strategic plan and a happy team of participants.
Larry,
I like your thinking. I think making sure that there are owners of action items is also important. The other component that is becoming increasingly important is making sure that the strategic plan is dynamic and updated on a regular basis. Higher education, like many other industries, is changing rapidly and I am finding that regular review of the plan and its goals, objectives is becoming increasingly important. How often do you think the strategic plan should be reviewed and updated?
Dr. Blake Faulkner
