How to Not to do Strategic Planning

May 12, 2008

Posted in Strategic Planning.

We’re knee-deep in strategic planning right now. Like many organizations, Our Camp Fire council doesn’t have a strategic plan in place to work from. We haven’t done this process before, and weren’t sure how to go about it. We just figured we needed to do it.

I’d like to write about this process over the next few months as we build our strategic plan. But first I’ll make a recommendation:

Get help.

We started the process by spinning our wheels, unsure of what a strategic plan should be. We didn’t know the format, how detailed we should get, or what kind of time period it should cover. Three years? Five? Ten? We got nowhere. We had no idea what we were doing.

Then we got some help. We turned to SCORE, who graciously agreed to help facilitate the process. Our SCORE guys, Norm and Fred, have done this many times before and have done a great job of keeping us from veering right over the edge of the cliff again. They provided resources and a framework for the strategic plan. They’ve attended many of our meetings and have kept our expectations realistic.

For instance, we’re no longer trying to knock out a strategic plan in under a month. We’re also bringing many others into the process, rather than having four or five board members try to pen the entire thing.

And we’re building momentum. Always important.

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