5 Reasons to Start Strategic Planning Today

With 2023 quickly approaching, many purpose-driven organizations may be thinking about designing new strategic plans to help ensure long-term sustainability and viability.

Having supported health and human services organizations, higher education institutions, credit unions, and associations, our strategic planning consultants have 5 reasons for you to start strategic planning today:

Get Your Team Aligned
Strategic planning helps to build cohesion and teamwork among an organization and individuals. In fact, most nonprofits will conduct strategic planning within the first two years following a change in leadership as a way to unify the new CEO, Board, staffing team, and stakeholders. 

The participation of the full team in the design and pursuit of high-performing outcomes unifies the team in purpose and action.

Establish or Improve Accountability

Strategic planning unites the team in understanding the overarching goals of an organization and helps to create clarity as to how each goal advances the plan toward completion. Providing each team member with a roadmap for performance establishes the direction for how their work relates to organizational goals. When team members understand their assignments, responsibilities, and benchmarks as they relate to the plan, those responsible for implementation can be held accountable for the results. Accountability is essential because it creates an environment of trust. 

Additionally, the Board has accountability for ensuring the plan is being implemented by the CEO. This requires the Board be in alignment with the organization’s strategic needs by having the skills and expertise required to support the plan. 

With accountability, an organization will be able to keep pace with implementation and operate at its fullest potential. 

Take on Large-Scale Change

A nonprofit strategic planning process can take months to complete. This timeline allows for the exploration of big ideas and the time for those ideas to incubate and grow. This is an ideal time to explore large-scale ideas such as a merger, major investment, or change in business model, so that they may be discussed at multiple levels from the board to front-line team members.

This not only ensures that multiple levels of perspective are taken into consideration, but also that a major change is being co-created among the whole team to support acceptance and successful implementation.

Delineate Between Strategic Planning & Business Planning

It is not unusual for an organization to be in the beginning stages of a strategic planning project when they realize the need for more immediate incremental moves to advance their departments, service lines, or programs.

While strategic planning addresses the major moves that an organization needs to make to remain relevant or a leader in a particular sector, business planning is more focused on the department or service level. The major differences between the two are timelines and scope. 

A typical strategic plan ranges in time from 3-5 years and is designed to take advantage of major trends and industry movements. The longer the timespan, the more vague and abstract the landscape becomes. However, if an organization’s foresight exceeds the competition, it can be a competitive advantage.

In conjunction with the strategic plan, a business plan allows an organization to be nimble and to address the service and more incremental planning levels to ensure every department or division has initiatives to focus on for achievement.

Building a Culture of Trust, Ownership, and Accountability

Once a strategic plan is complete, the ability to successfully achieve the goals depends on implementation. If the approach is well-organized and coordinated using a project management tool, then the likelihood of success increases.

With communication being an integral part of the implementation, it should be made a priority throughout the process. The involvement of employees at all levels throughout the process keeps them informed and engaged, leading to better long-term outcomes. 

Over time, the trust, ownership, and accountability built during implementation will become part of the organization’s culture. When everyone in the organization is working toward the same purpose, productivity, and morale increase leading to more successful outcomes and culture.