Strategic Management includes creating and revising your company’s mission, vision, and values; devising and revising your strategic plan; and making strategic decisions during the implementation of your strategic plan. It’s worth noting that most plans fail because they aren’t paid enough attention, and not because of external factors. Plans need to be shared and understood, with everyone knowing their role and contribution to the tasks and goals. To ensure that, plans also need to be managed through regular review and follow-up.
One of the biggest changes in how strategic plans are implemented is the current focus on frequent assessment. This involves data on performance measures as well as those drivers of change that you identified. Be sure that your measures and indicators are assessing the right factors. Make adjustments if you don’t think you’re seeing the whole picture.
It’s important to remember that your strategy may need to change, even without some catastrophe occurring. For example, if one of your goals is to bring on 60 new dealers (five per month on average), and after three months, you’ve only acquired one, you need to look at how many dealers were approached, how they were contacted, what the pitch was, what objections were heard, etc. You don’t change the goal – only the steps to get there.
Now, let’s say that all of the dealers contacted so far were in the same location that typically gets a cold and snowy winter. You see though that their long-term weather forecast is for a warmer and dryer winter this year. This is one of your climate change indicators, and if you also see that the change is expected to impact the entire region, it’s time to pivot to your appropriate scenario strategy.
It’s recommended that you review and analyze progress measures and indicators monthly, and more often if you get information that is relevant and significant. Every quarter, look for trends that may be appearing in your data. Review your foundational commitments – vision, mission, values – before you make decisions on changing strategy. While it may be tempting to amend goals, alter your purpose, or throw up your hands in frustration, the closer you stick to the brand you created purposefully, the more successful you will be.
Wishing you smooth sailing!
View More in This Series: Strategic Planning in a Capricious World