All great leaders dream of business success. However, when they start working, they soon realise that there are many things to do and limited resources to do it with. Where do I start? Where do I focus my attention first? The answer to such questions may vary depending on different points of view. And of course, there are as many points of view as there are people in the world. So how can we go about this?
The truth is that in today’s competitive business world, you need an action plan. A plan that guides decisions and helps align everyone in the team to achieve success. This is what we call strategic planning, and it plays a critical role in the long-term success of an organisation.
From small startups to large corporations, having a clear vision of the future and a well-defined plan to achieve goals is essential, as according to the CB Insights report, 35% of startups fail due to their inability to create a plan that meets the needs of the market.
What is strategic planning and why is it important?
Strategic planning is a process that involves defining an organisation’s long-term objectives, assessing available resources, and formulating strategies to achieve those objectives. Simply put, it is the path a company chooses to follow, and the actions it must prioritise to achieve success.
This process is broad in scope, and involves the individual plans or projects of each employee or department, as these must be aligned to achieve the business objectives and move the company forward.
Therefore, strategic planning is necessary and important, as it provides a clear direction and framework for decision-making at all levels of the organisation. Without a well-defined strategy, companies risk getting lost in a sea of uncertainty, facing unforeseen challenges and difficulty adapting to an ever-changing business environment.
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Benefits of effective strategic planning
Using strategic planning as a framework in the workplace brings multiple benefits to the organisation, such as:
- It provides a clear vision of the future: Strategic planning allows a company to have a clear vision of where it is going and what actions are needed to get there. However, it is necessary to emphasise that it is not a tool that predicts the future, nor is it capable of eliminating risks, but it does contribute to the identification of risks to design preventive coping strategies.
- Allows the alignment of resources: The implementation of strategic planning in companies helps to align the human, financial and technological resources of the organisation to maximise its efficiency and effectiveness.
- Facilitates decision-making: According to a survey conducted by McKinsey, only 20% of respondents say that their organisations excel in decision-making. Strategic planning facilitates this process by defining a key objective, which in turn is measurable and demonstrates how individual projects contribute to the overall plan.
- It increases adaptability: This strategy enables companies to anticipate and adapt to changes in the business environment, minimising risks and taking advantage of opportunities.
- Facilitates team coordination and collaboration: Regardless of the type of communication within the company, strategic planning enables coordination and collaboration between different departments and teams within the organisation, fostering a collective approach towards achieving business goals. This cooperative spirit, in turn, contributes to the development of a climate of mental health at work.
- Enables measurement of progress: Having a defined plan in place provides a framework for measuring progress and evaluating the organisation’s performance against set objectives.
Steps for effective strategic planning
Strategic planning strategies can vary according to the type of company, the particular needs of the company, or the type of objective to be achieved. This means that leaders have the flexibility to tailor the strategy to suit their teams.
Generally speaking, however, effective strategic planning should include the following:
- Environmental analysis: The first step in any strategy design is to assess the internal and external environment of the organisation, identifying available resources, strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats, in order to know the starting line.
- Setting objectives: Once we know the context of our organisation, we must clearly define the long-term objectives to be achieved. To do this, we must ensure that the objectives to be defined meet the characteristics of SMART goals, i.e. that they are specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and timely.
- Developing the strategies to be followed: Once the objectives have been defined, the strategies and tactics to achieve them must be developed, taking into account the available resources and capacities of the organisation in general, and of the teams at the individual level.
- Implementation and execution: Once the plan and the activities or tasks to be implemented have been defined, they must be put into practice. That is, the strategies must be implemented effectively, assigning clear responsibilities, setting deadlines, and providing the necessary resources to those responsible for each task.
- Evaluation and control: The last step should be to monitor and evaluate progress regularly, to make adjustments as necessary, or make the plan more flexible so that it adapts to the organisation’s time frame.
Unlock your team’s potential
At ifeel, we know that strategic planning is a critical component to the long-term success of any business, providing clear guidance for decision-making, promoting team alignment and collaboration, and improving organisational resilience in a dynamic business environment. By investing time and resources in strategic planning, companies can maximise their competitiveness and secure their market position in the future.
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We hope you found this article on strategic planning interesting. If you would like more information about our mental well-being solution for companies, just ask us and we will get in touch with your team as soon as possible.
