I really enjoy facilitating strategic planning. Lucky, as I’ve done a lot of it over the 10+ years I’ve operated my own facilitation and coaching practice.
I enjoy creating a safe space for teams to discuss, identify and prioritise what they want to achieve, providing room for everyone to participate and allowing for the important conversations to rise to the surface.
Who calls on me for strategic planning
I do a lot of work for boards.
It’s one of the key roles of a board to set the big picture strategic direction for an organisation. This might be called a vision, mission, purpose statement, future we want to see, values or any combination of those things.
While it’s the board’s responsibility, it’s not done by the board in an ‘ivory tower’. It should be done in concert with – or at least with input from – senior leadership team, staff and key stakeholders.
At the start of each year, many organisations and boards engage an experienced strategic planning facilitator for a variety of reasons, such as:
- To reflect on and assess progress of an existing strategic plan
- To identify any gaps in the plans based on changes to the organisation or market
- To rework the strategic plan after a merger or significant change in operations
- To create a new plan when the previous strategy has run its time
- To introduce and involve new people, such as a new CEO or chair
Tip #1 Strategic planning is as much about identifying what you are not going to do, as it is about planning what you are going to do. No organisation I have ever worked with has enough resources to do everything. Given that strategy guides the allocation of resources, a key part of strategic thinking is prioritisation. Be clear on what you are going to do and what you are not going to do, or at least, what you are not going to do for now.
There are many different ways to do strategic planning
Wikipedia broadly describes strategic planning as ‘an organisation’s process of defining its strategy or direction, and making decisions on allocating its resources to attain strategic goals’.
A search for ‘strategic planning’ will show an endless variety of frameworks and models. Some long, some short. Some complex, some simple.
I prefer simple. And because values sit at the core of pretty much everything I do, ‘purpose’ plays an important role in my own strategic planning framework.
How the my three Ps framework works
The picture above shows my three Ps framework in the centre.
To sum up, here’s how the framework is delivered:
- Purpose and priorities workshop: The more ‘abstract’ component of the framework are often explored and defined in the workshop environment.
- Plan development: This ‘concrete’ component of the framework is often developed by the staff after the workshop and is then approved by the board.
First… creating a thinking, feeling, exploring space
You’ll notice there’s a section in the picture above called ‘how can we make today a success’. Every workshop I facilitate starts with this – the workshop’s ground rules.
Tip #2 It’s important that the group sets their own ground rules. It’s key to ensuring psychological safety in the room, which means that we’ll get the best out of the discussion.
You’ll also notice that the picture has a ‘bring a thing’ section.
I often open a workshop with the ‘bring a thing’ activity. I ask participants to ‘bring something that represents the future of our organisation’. They use their ‘thing’ to help introduce themselves. It has the dual purpose of connecting and learning about each other, as well as linking to ‘purpose’ from the get-go.
Tip #3 Workshops are different to a board meeting. Board meetings tend to be about decisions. Workshops are about thinking, feeling and exploring. So, the workshop space needs to look and feel different to the boardroom.
Then, put the three Ps to action
1. Purpose and priorities
About: Strategy always starts with purpose. It’s the long-term vision. Although purpose often doesn’t change strategy to strategy, discussions should always start with it. It’s the light on the hill that frames the rest of the discussion.
So the first step in a workshop – or a strategy development process – is to either develop or confirm the purpose statement. This could be a workshop all on its own if it’s being developed, or the first part of a workshop if we are confirming.
This initial collaborative workshop is usually held with the board, CEO and (often) members of the senior leadership team. This work is informed by views and input from key stakeholders’ (e.g. members, partners, clients, funders, etc) and sometimes a desktop review of similar organisations and industry developments.
Once the purpose is clear and confirmed, the workshop may move on to developing the strategic priorities. That is, what are the key ‘chunks of work’ that an organisation needs to do to fulfil its purpose. These strategic priorities might be for a 3-5 year horizon, that is, for the period of the strategy.
Sometimes this thinking also incorporates developing clear, measurable outcomes for each strategic priority.
Tip #4 The workshop’s ‘agenda’ needs to have space for thinking rather than ‘just’ deciding. This means I will work with you to refine the agenda – most organisations start with too much. There’s not many briefing meetings with clients where I don’t say ‘there’s too much on the agenda!’.
2. Plan development
About: This is often called ‘the business plan’ or ‘the operational plan’. It’s about who is doing what and when. How detailed a strategic plan is depends on the organisation’s size and complexity.
Tip #5 The written strategic plan is a communication tool. It often needs to speak to a number of different audiences, each with different information needs. It’s therefore a good idea to identify who your plan will need to talk to before you start pulling it all together. Some organisations will only need to read the key points, so a one-pager would be enough for them. Others will want to detail to deliver the plan, thus it’s important to know the kind of detail they need.
How the framework was customised for these orgs
Example 1: Queen Elizabeth Centre (QEC)
About this org: QEC is Victoria’s largest provider of early parenting services. I have facilitated QEC’s strategic planning workshops for a number of years.
QEC’s three Ps: The purpose and priorities workshops have always included their board, CEO and senior management team. The most recent session was to assess progress against the plan, and to explore some ‘future thinking’ ideas.
Example 2: The Cat Protection Society of Victoria
About this org: The Cat Protection Society of Victoria is a not-for-profit animal welfare organisation committed to working with the community to ensure that every cat has the opportunity for a loving, safe and healthy home. I facilitated a strategic planning workshop for this organisation for the first time in 2019 and was back again in 2021 and 2024.
The Cat Protection Society of Victoria’s three Ps: The purpose and priorities workshops included their board, CEO and senior management team. In the most recent discussion, we focussed on measures of success for the next strategy.
Example 3: Neami
About this org: Neami was established in 1986 to address the growing housing needs of people leaving hospital and fill in the gaps in services for people experiencing mental health challenges. I was engaged to facilitate a two-day board and leadership team retreat in March 2024 to explore priorities.
Neami’s three Ps: Held at Lancemore Mansion Hotel Werribee Park over a Friday and Saturday in February 2024. The retreat was held in two parts. On the first day, the full team was present and explored vision, values and strategic themes. This was built on through a discussion of internal and external context. The second day was just for the board, company secretary and the CEO and looked at how the board could best support the new strategy.
