In an increasingly busy world, focus is everything, and a strategic plan facilitates this in a school setting. We live in a world of rapid change and all sorts of problems, from rising socio-economic inequality to terrorism, environmental challenges to mental illness and lack of wellbeing across all areas of society. These things affect everyone in our schools, from students to school leaders, but strategic planning as a school can help us harness education as a power to change the world.
By nurturing a love of learning, goodness, creativity and ingenuity, we give our students the tools they need to make their way through the many challenges we face.
But what does an effective strategic plan actually look like? What should it include and focus on? What principles should guide the establishment of a strategic plan? A school strategic plan should always be:. Any strategic plan should be truly focused on the future. Help those involved in strategic planning to be future-focused by sharing resources to inspire them and help them see beyond their current concerns in the lead up to your planning meetings.
Creating a school strategic plan should always be a collaborative process, not something imposed from the top down. Input and buy-in from all stakeholders will not only minimise the chance of blind spots and unlock collective genius, it will ensure that everyone is committed to the plan. Get all members of the community — including students! This might mean a three-year plan, with twelve month action plans in place within that, and ninety day reviews built in.
Each of these reviews is an opportunity to celebrate short term wins, recommit to the plan, and of course, to revise the plan. The factors the company elects to use as reference points for the plan's success are customer retention and new user acquisition.
Once those have been established, leadership would explain why the goals, plans, and metrics it has outlined make sense. If you track the process I've just plotted, you'll see the Theory of Change in motion — it starts with a big-picture goal and works its way down to specific initiatives and ways to gauge their effectiveness.
The Hoshin Planning model is a process that aims to reduce friction and inefficiency by promoting active and open communication throughout an organization. In this model, everyone within an organization — regardless of department or seniority — is made aware of the company's goals.
Hoshin Planning rests on the notion that thorough communication creates cohesion, but that takes more than contributions from leadership. This model requires that results from every level be shared with management — from the shop floor up.
The ideal outcomes set according to this model are also conceived of by committee — to a certain extent. Hoshin Planning involves management hearing and considering feedback from subordinates to come up with reasonable, realistic, and mutually understood goals. Image Source: i-nexus. The model is typically partitioned into seven steps: establishing a vision, developing breakthrough objectives, developing annual objectives, deploying annual objectives, implementing annual objectives, conducting monthly and quarterly reviews, and conducting an annual review.
The first three steps are referred to as the "catchball process. That stage is what really separates Hoshin Planning from other models. For this example, let's imagine a company that manufactures commercial screen printing machines.
The business has seen success with smaller-scale, retail printing operations — but it's realized that selling almost exclusively to that market won't make for long-term, sustainable growth.
Leadership at the company decides that it's interested in making an aggressive push to move up-market towards larger enterprise companies — but before they can establish that vision, they want to ensure that the entire company is willing and able to work with them to reach those goals. Once they've set a tentative vision, they begin to establish more concrete objectives and send them down the management hierarchy. One of the most pressing activities they're interested in pursuing is a near-comprehensive product redesign to make their machines better suited for higher volume orders.
They communicate those goals throughout the organization and ask for feedback along the way. After the product team hears their ideal plans, it relays that the product overhaul that leadership is looking into isn't viable within the timeframe they've provided. Leadership hears this and adjusts their expectations before doling out any sort of demands for the redesign.
Once both parties agree on a feasible timeline, they begin to set more definitive objectives that suit both the company's ambitions and the product team's capabilities. There are additional resources you can use to support whatever strategic planning model you put in place.
Here are some of those:. SWOT analysis is a strategic planning tool and acronym for s trengths, w eaknesses, o pportunities, and t hreats. It's used to identify each of these elements in relation to your business. This strategic planning tool allows you to determine new opportunities and which areas of your business need improvement. You'll also identify any factors or threats that might negatively impact your business or success. Image Source: HubSpot. Use Porter's Five Forces as a strategic planning tool to identify the economic forces that impact your industry and determine your business' competitive position.
The five forces include:. To learn more, check out this comprehensive guide to using Porter's Five Forces. It stands for:. Each of these elements allow an organization to take stock of the business environment they're operating in, which helps them develop a strategy for success. Visioning is a goal-setting strategy used in strategic planning.
It helps your organization develop a vision for the future and the outcomes you'd like to achieve. Once you reflect on the goals you'd like to reach within the next five years or more, you and your team can identify the steps you need to take to get where you'd like to be. From there, you can create your strategic plan. The VRIO framework is another strategic planning tool that's used to identify the competitive advantages of your product or service. It's composed of four different elements:.
By analyzing each of these areas in your business, you'll be able to create a strategic plan that helps you cater to the needs of your customer. With these strategic planning models and tools, you'll be able to create a comprehensive and effective strategic plan. To learn more, check out the ultimate guide to strategic planning next. Editor's note: This post was originally published on May 17, and has been updated for comprehensiveness.
Originally published Jun 23, PM, updated June 23 Subscribe to Our Blog Stay up to date with the latest marketing, sales, and service tips and news. Thank You! You have been subscribed. Start free or get a demo. Sales 10 min read. HubSpot also recommends this free sales plan template.
Download Now. What's a plan without a strategy? Strategic Planning Models Strategic planning is used to set up long-term goals and priorities for an organization. Here are a few strategic planning models you can use to get started. The Balanced Scorecard The Balanced Scorecard is one of the most prominent strategic planning models, tailored to give managers a comprehensive overview of their companies' operations on tight timelines.
We start first by understanding existing strategic planning beliefs and processes to align on goals, roles, and structure. We engage with your stakeholders to assess strengths and capabilities while identifying room for growth. We define a vision and a set of initiatives that prioritize what matters most to your community, creating a communication plan.
And we help you develop metrics to monitor progress so that you know when you are achieving your goals and when you need to pivot. How we helped South Brunswick School District. We Have Helped These Districts. How we can help you We offer three support options for strategic planning: Reach out to talk with us about how we might support you and your teams. Our approach to strategic planning Inspiration to drive change based on beliefs, values, and a view toward long term success Transparency while designing the plan to encourage broad ownership Engagement with diverse stakeholder groups throughout the process Traceability from vision and beliefs to goals, actions, and outcomes Responsive roadmap, support systems, and actions that align to goals and based on current context Measurable outcomes with metrics that are easily monitored for progress.
Our clients work with us, and refer us to others, for three key reasons: We are expert facilitators, who engage diverse groups and bring in processes and protocols that drive collaboration, alignment, and action. We customize our approach based on your unique needs, taking time to learn your context.
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