STRATEGIC PLANNING

Abstract

            Strategic planning is an essential activity for each and every organization as it ensures that the organization is not only strengthened but also ensures that the organization is able to sustain its organizational success. This can be defined as the improvement of the decision making rules and principles that directs the future actions of the organization. This activity requires a process that determines the long-term objectives of the organization, techniques for formulating and examining the substitute strategies and a system to observe the implementation of the plan. This helps to determine the progress of the organization within the short and long term goals, the techniques to be applied to achieve these goals and the measures to determine whether the goals have been attained. The current trend in organizations especially the public sectors which are currently handling more important roles which were currently undertaken by the private sector is becoming more critical. Planning is therefore important as it offers a cultural considerate action, better decision making and well enriched organizational efficiency and more increased value.  Bryson formulated a strategic change cycle which comprehensively permitted the organization to formulate a strategic plan that involved ten non-sequential steps. Each and every step in this cycle is as important as the other while the entire strategic change cycle is responsible for the provision of a thorough plan and system of measure and balancing of the organization that is involved in the application of the strategic planning (Bryson 2011).  This paper therefore will focus its argument on the Bryson’s ten non-sequential steps in an organization, their merits and the core purpose of the steps in an organization with an in-depth analysis.

 

Initiate and agree on a strategic planning process

            This is the first step of the ten non-sequential steps by Bryson and it is involved with the setting up of direction. Setting a direction focuses in reaching to an initial agreement on the general strategic plan, identification and the settlement of critical and strategic issues , the performers, the scenes as well as the overall current situation.  This step therefore negotiates a settlement amongst the chief decision makers that involves the beginning of the plan, the midway development and the desired conclusion together with the methods to get there. The process flows smoothly especially when there is an effective coordinating committee but most of the organizations are currently hiring consultants and advisors on the same. According to Bryson, the success of the overall strategic plan heavily relies on the support and obligation of the main decision makers (Bryson 2011). This initial agreement ought to be negotiated with at least some of the chief decision makers as accomplishing agreements at the start on the way to function and divide the work results in far lesser problems in the later time. This is to mean that any emergence of the problem later may be able to be solved or rather filtered in the setting of the agreement and the right procedures on problem solving using the approved set of rules will follow. The merits of this step is that it persuades the people who are concerned with the strategic plan, develops their commitment to the plan, influences them to strategically think and provide legitimacy to the firm. Thus a good initial plan should be inclusive of a general outline of the efforts and signify the significance of the chief decision makers at all levels in the firm while the agreement will specify the objective and main purpose of their efforts.

 Thus it is important for the steering committee of this strategic plan to define, modify and comes up with an agreement. This will enhance the committee to identify the roles and oversee the implementation of the plan and the required resources (Bryson 2011).

Identify organizational mandates

            This is the second step that involves identification of the mandates that affects the strategic plan of the organization. The core purpose of this step is to explain the nature and significance of externally imposed obligations that the organization is required to achieve. These obligations may be expressed in a formal or in an informal way. Thus before the clarification of the organization’s mission and the satisfaction of the main stakeholders, the organization must identify the organizations obligations (Bryson 2011).  Hence they are supposed to know what they are formally or informally required to do by the exterior authorities. Formal prerequisites are basically organized in the laws, principles, decrees, articles of corporation and licenses thus making it easier to uncover as well as clarify than the missions of the organization. In addition, the informal obligations in the organization must be met and they may be exemplified in norms or in the expectations of the main stakeholders. This step will therefore ensure that the organization is able to explain the requirements of the obligations that are the exploitation of the objectives and the indicators of performance (Bryson 2011). It will also help in making clarification on the restricted obligations and the permitted mandates that allows unconstrained field of achievement. Thus it is important to understand that obligations are quite critical and can result to the change of the entire strategic plan in an organization. With a clear understanding of the external obligations, there is the possibility of increased capability of the organization to successfully attain their objectives and missions. The organization is also able to create a public value since their actions are mandated by the stakeholders.

 

 

Clarify organizational mission and values

            Before undertaking any strategic planning, the organization should have a clear mission which is agreed upon by the main stakeholders. This is quite essential as it institutes the organization’s purpose as well as leading the organization towards a concrete measure of both failure and success. The mission in an organization lays out the core activities the organization undertakes while the values in an organization guide the operations of the organization (Bryson 2011). Therefore, organizations should use values as well as mission with an aim of creating a vision of achievement so long as it follows the strategic plan put in place. Mission statement ought to be informational for all the people in the organization that is the workers, the administration and the customers (Lewis 2007). This will thus enhance all the stakeholders to be aware of the organization’s direction, existence and its operations. The vision statement of any organization creates an image of a vivid painting of the firm as it implements their strategic organization. In the current dynamic world, the significance of value statements in an organization is growing rapidly as they guide the organization into a developing globalized market. These values motivate the management and the all the employees in an organization and are highly prioritized by the leadership as it influences their decision.

 

 

Assess the external and internal environments to identify strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats

            The scanning of the environment is quite essential as it provides the firm with the sense of the accomplishments within a certain restrain. Strategic administration involves the managerial role to attain the competitive advantage through the optimization of both the internal and external conditions (Bryson 2011). It majorly is concerned with the gathering of information that is relating to the external and internal factors that may influence the evolution of an organization. This is thus referred to as the SWOT analysis that takes into account the weakness and strengths as the internal factors in the organization together with the opportunities and threats as the external factors that may affect the organization. This helps the organization to undertake their strategic planning process but it also ensures that the organizations capabilities and resources are matching with the competitive environment in which the organization is carrying out its operations. As the internal environment is analyzed, the organizational structure, its culture, image market share among others helps the organization in determining their strengths and weakness within these factors (Bryson 2011). While the examination of the external environment enables the organization to realize the political, customers, competitors, suppliers, partners, social and technological changes hence are enabling the organization to be able to identify the threats that face their organization and the existence of the opportunities that surround their organization. It is thus important for the SWOT analysis to be undertaken in any strategic planning as this will lead to the success of the business since there will be a chance to improve on the strengths and the seizing of the opportunity with conversion of the weaknesses into strength and the prevention of threats.

 

Identify the strategic issues facing the organization

            Strategic issues are essential policy questions or the serious challenges that are affecting the obligations of the organization, mission and vision, products and the organization’s services, customers, cost and everything else in the organization. This step involves the description of the issue concisely, identifying the factors that make the issue an essential challenge and realizing the consequences of failing to address that challenge (Bryson 2004). It is at this stage that the organization realizes the list of issues that they encounter and they sub-divide these issues into sub-divisions of strategic and operational and finally organizes the issues into logical order for instance the priority, logic and chronological order. This step is quite beneficial in the planning process as it identifies the strategic issues that will assist the stakeholders determine what is most essential in an organization (Bryson 2011). This will also enable them see the issues and not answers to the issues thus they are able to engage in lively debates and tension while facilitating the issues. According to Bryson, he states that this is one of the steps where most of the decision makers want to quit since the step often creates tension, stress and depression hence making it difficult for decision makers to continue with the planning process. Since this process is so much involving, it should be undertaken with so much caution and thoughtfully so as to attain the goals of the organization. There are different approaches that are implemented in identifying the strategic issues within an organization.

 

 

 

 

Formulate strategies to manage the issues

            This step involves the building up of ideas and the presence of discussion podiums to foster participation and the engagement of the people. The core purpose of this step is to create procedures to address each and every priority issue that has been realized in the step above so that the organization can be able to successfully achieve their mission, values, visions, obligations, objectives as well as the overall creation of public value (Bryson 2011).  Strategy is defined as an arrangement of functions, policies, platforms, activities, resource allocation and assessments that defines the operations of the organization, the rationale behind its operations and the description of the organization. Thus in relation to this definition, the strategies act as bridges that does connect the organization with its surrounding environment and the various challenges that the organization deals with. Strategies are therefore formulated so as to deal with the strategic issues (Bryson 2011).

This is to mean that the strategies outline the responses of the challenges that the organization is facing and they build a bridge needed which is basically the strategies needed. Therefore, the determination of this step is to generate the plans that will assist the organization into addressing the fundamental policy issues. The most important thing to be noted in this strategy is that the most essential thing to be applied in this step is the strategic thinking, acting as well as learning rather than a particular approach towards the formulation of the strategic plan (Alston 2013). The coordinating committee should therefore formulate strategies that are highly adoptable and are widely accepted politically and technically and are managerially workable, end-product oriented, legally and morally defendable.

Thus the role of the formulation of strategies is to highlight what is good in the available pattern, reframing what is bad about the pattern and adding up of whatever new innovations may be needed for the success of the organization’s strategic planning.

Review and adopt the strategies or strategic plan

            In as much as many peopled may argue that step six and seven are similar, but they should be separated while planning. Strategies are mostly adopted by elected and appointed policy board members. Formal adoption of strategic plans basically involves the political scheming, hard-hitting bargaining, public pretense and high performance. Most of the organizations may have their strategies remaining for a long period without changing but may abruptly change (Bryson 2011). In this case, most of the organizations in most of the time, their strategic plan will be interested in adopting and programming only those strategies that are outlined as reasonable and are clear. However, at other times the organization’s strategic plan may be called upon to assist in formulating of new strategies so as to deal with new and different situations or issues. Unfortunately, in times of crises the organization may fail to implement on their organization’s existing strategic plan thus being forced to adopt a new strategic plan or rather they integrate both the old and new strategies (Alston 2013). Thus the organization is always called on to continuously develop new levels of strategies so as to continue improving their newly adopted strategies. These strategies may either be long term or short term.

 

 

 

Establish an effective organizational vision

            This step develops a strong and concise explanation of how an association should appear like as it effectively applies its procedures, attains its complete prospective and generates important communal value. The step offers a guideline towards a strategic implementation of the plan as opposed to the strategy formulation. Comparison of the various visions of achievement to the present reality offers tension that is attributed to the motivation of organization to formulate a strategic plan (Bryson 2011). The step is expected to formulate a vision that describes the mission, attributes, objectives and core values if they have already been established. It should also give details on the performance criteria including the decision rules, ethical issues amongst the workers. The vision should also emphasize on the purpose, criterion, decision making regulations and the various standards that are aimed at serving the public and not the organization and should ensure that value is created. Hence the guidance offered ought to be specific as well as reasonable. The vision therefore gives a wide description of the way the organization ought to look like especially when it is operating extremely well in regard to its surrounding and its main stakeholders. The merits of this step is that it offers guidance that is both supportive and reasonable as well as specific basing on what is expected from them and the reasons as to the expectations (Bryson 2011). The vision of achievement makes it quite easier for the people to critique between the chosen and the undesirable actions and results hence producing better results on the desired actions.  Once there is the agreement on the vision for the organization, then there is the precise guidance and decision making regulations that are derived from the vision hence reducing the amount of time used in debating on the rules and guidance (Alston 2013). This therefore results in the attainment of control and efficiency in the organization.

Develop an effective implementation process

            Successful implementation of the strategic plan completes the transition process from the strategic planning to strategic management. This is carried out through the incorporation of the adopted strategies throughout the process. Once the programs, developments, action strategies, budgets and the implementation system are developed effectively, life is brought to the strategies as obligations are met and the missions are achieved. There result of this step will be the great success of the organization’s objectives and increased stakeholders fulfillment hence resulting to a greater public value. The implementers of the strategic plan will be capable to understand when, how and who ought to carry out each role in the implementation. This will thus result to a successful implementation of the plan which includes the summary of the evaluation so as to measure whether the strategic objectives have been met once the planning has been implemented. As the strategy is implemented, there is the establishment of the real public value and as the changes are presented smoothly and rapidly, the objectives that are worthwhile in the organization are attained and the contentment of the stakeholders is as well achieved.  The organization is also able to avoid typical issues that cause failure of the organization when the strategy is implemented (Bryson 2011).  Successful implementation of the strategic planning causes an increase in the kind of support offered by the leadership committee and the organization itself as they have also implemented the changes and hence making them legitimate. Those that are involved in the efficient implementation process experience high self-esteem and confidence (Alston 2013). It is thus significant for an organization to develop communication as well as learning process for all stakeholders in the organization so as to maintain the responsibility of the process implementers throughout the strategic plan implementation.

 

Reassess the strategies and the strategic planning process

            The strategy change cycle is basically not over once the implementation process is done but however it continues due to changes in time, situation and coalition. In this stage so many stakeholders such as the directors, the leaders and the rest of the stakeholders are the ones tasked with the process of reviewing the strategies that have already been implemented, those that have emerged along the process and they are reviewed so as to examine whether they are suitable to be maintained, terminated or revised. The desirable strategies which are regarded as good are maintained while those that are undesirable are terminated. This allows the mobilization of energy and interest to address the next essential strategic issues that accompany the planning. This stage helps to better the organizational knowledge and cooperation throughout all levels in the organization. This stage also raises growth of energy, will, determination and new ideas for reforming the existing strategies.

Conclusion

            It is therefore important to note that each and every step out of the ten of is important. One step progressively leads to the other step. Hence it is important for the organization management to understand each and every step and their varying purposes in the success of the business. From the start of the formulation of the initial agreement to the last step we can prove that proper coordination is required as the success of each and every step relies on the coordination capability. Therefore it is quite essential for the organization to choose efficient active and committed coordinating committees members who have the organizations best interest at heart.  Commitment to these strategic changes and cycles is relevant in ensuring that the organization attains its goals.

 Both the internal factors of the organization and the external factors of the business are as well important hence they should be analyzed well and proper action taken on those that are not in favor with the organization’s goals. Education and creation of awareness is quite essential for each and every stakeholder in the organization. This is because each and every individual is important in the success of the strategic plan.  The success of the organization’s goals also relies on the resources available to see to it that the strategic plans are effectively implemented. It is thus recommended that each and every organization should make efforts in formulating, coordinating and implementing the strategic plan.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

References

Alston, F. K., & Bryson, J. M. (2013). Creating and implementing your strategic plan: A workbook for          public and nonprofit organizations. San Francisco, Calif: Jossey-Bass.

Bryson, J. M. (2004). Strategic planning for public and nonprofit organizations: A guide to             strengthening and sustaining organizational achievement. San Francisco, Calif: Jossey-    Bass.

Bryson, J. M. (2011). Strategic planning for public and nonprofit organizations: A guide to strengthening and sustaining organizational achievement.

Bryson, J. M., & Alston, F. K. (2011). Creating your strategic plan: A workbook for public and nonprofit                 organizations. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Lewis, P. S. (2007). Management: Challenges for tomorrow's leaders. Mason, OH: Thomson/South-           Western.