Strategic Planning – What it is and Why it is Essential

Strategic planning is crucial to a nonprofit organization’s upcoming path and survival. As this kind of, it is vital to comprehend what strategic planning is and why it is so significant. This article supplies a definition of strategic planning and why it is significant to nonprofit corporations.

Wikipedia defines strategic planning as “an organization’s system of defining its strategy, or direction, and generating decisions on allocating its means to go after this strategy, including its capital and folks.” Strategic planning is the formal consideration of an organization’s future program. All strategic planning promotions with at the very least a single of a few important queries:

1. The to start with critical concern is “What do we do?” This relates to the organization’s vision and mission. An organization’s vision is broad… it is the closing goal the group aspires to accomplish. The organization’s mission is a statement describing how the group is going to meet its vision. For case in point, an organization’s vision may possibly be to hire all people with disabilities. Its mission may well be “As a result of the provision of vocational counseling, job searching for expertise teaching, and job advancement and placement, guide persons with disabilities to get or keep meaningful work.”

2. The next vital issue is “For whom do we do it?” The corporation requirements to be distinct about who its purchasers are in get to build or modify packages and companies to fulfill their requirements.

3. The 3rd vital question is “How do we excel?” This query relates to how very well the corporation is executing and what it could be executing much better to best fulfills the demands of its shoppers. It also reminds the group to assess its level of competition and develop a strategy to be the leading company in its field.

Though these a few queries really should often be regarded as when creating, modifying, or deleting programs and expert services, it is also important that they be tackled just before and all through the strategic planning method. The solutions to these issues will assist the business to decide its path, specifically where by it stands, where it desires to go, and how it will get there. The ensuing document is known as the “strategic plan.”

Strategic planning is a course of action companies should really have interaction in on an ongoing foundation, irrespective of the length of the plan. Some companies engage in tactical planning, which is primarily a one particular year strategic plan. Tactical ideas are formulated when an business is brand new or develops a new software or assistance that was not integrated in the unique strategic plan. Frequently, even so, most strategic designs are 3-5 many years. Although some designs could be lengthier, it is challenging to predict chances, threats, and tendencies in the field further than 3 decades. No matter whether the plan’s duration is one year or longer, the crucial matter to maintain in brain is building a plan that strategically moves the group in the correct direction.

Without having strategic planning and a ensuing plan of motion, the business will not have a clear thought of what it is undertaking, why it is doing it, and exactly where it is likely. If there are no targets and aims in area to address stakeholder challenges/considerations, increase systems/services, or grow the group, it may perhaps not be in a position to go on meeting the requirements of the pretty people it is meant to serve. In addition, the deficiency of a plan could compromise public have confidence in, result in a loss of funding, or avert the corporation from pursuing new funding options and partnerships. Devoid of planning, an business becomes stagnant.

Copyright 2010 © Sharon L. Mikrut, All legal rights reserved.