Strategic planning is way too important to be ignored or not to be considered. However, according to the research, 86% of the executive teams spend less than one hour every month discussing their strategic plan, and 95% of the employees are unaware of the company’s strategy and vision.

Knowing the market is not working in this domain – so if you want to take the lead, you need to be active in your company’s strategic planning.

We will try to give you a basic understanding of a strategic plan and the steps to implement it.

What is Strategic Planning

Strategic planning means having a defined vision; around which you would be planning your business’s objectives and action items. It implies the organization knows its way forward, i.e., exactly where they are going, how they are planning to win the market, which amongst its team is going to be responsible for what, and what would be their criteria for evaluation and implementation.

In short, strategic planning demonstrates a process a company follows to develop a detailed plan for identifying and achieving its goals.

It is not the same as the usual project planning, where tasks for individual projects are assigned after finalizing the scope.

The strategic plan is broader in terms of planning and execution – here, you need to create a complete roadmap defining what to do, what not to do, why to do it, and how to do it.

Overview of the whole process/ Introduction

This process involves identifying the most effective way to proceed from one point to the next in the planning journey and efficiently managing the execution.

It would cover all the guidelines on moving forward in the process and keep checking at every step.

This process is time-consuming, and it would require a minimum of three to four months to cover all the phases of strategic planning. But, it is only upon the company to decide on what pace they prefer to take this effort.

Before getting into the drill of strategic planning, you should familiarize yourself with all the phases and steps involved to set the best plan for your organization.

So, let’s start exploring the four phases of strategic planning and better understand them in depth.

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1. Environmental Scanning/ Determine Your Strategic Position

In this phase, we focus on collecting complete related information and organizing it before we can analyze it. We use this information to recognize threats and opportunities. It aims to identify the competitor’s current policies, processes, problems, and solutions before defining the strategy.

Many stakeholders are involved in this process, and both external and internal sources are covered. Internal sources include executives of your organization and your customers. In comparison, external components include collecting market and industrial data. It helps to paint a transparent picture of your market standing and gives you insight into your position.

This process also assists with a recreation of your vision and mission statement to portray a clear image of what achievements you want to have. Moreover, the company’s core values are also included in this recreation of the statement to achieve the values more diligently. Industry and market data is utilized to get started. Internal strengths and weaknesses grouped with external factors and threats are also inculcated in the study.

Analysis like SWOT is being used. SWOT diagram consists of strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. All the data collected from customers, executives, and the external market is analyzed through SWOT, which quickly helps you strategically create a clear image of yourself in the market.

Let’s take an example of the scenario where your organization wants to improve internal communication and overall culture. For this, your organization needs to explore how other successful companies have achieved it. Only then will you see your company’s gaps and be able to frame a strategy: considering your company’s potential, the level of change you want to bring, and crafting the whole process to execute it successfully.

2. Strategy Formulation/ Develop a strategic plan

The information and insight collected in the previous phase form the basis of strategy formulation. Now you have a clear picture of your standing in the market, and you know the gaps that need to be filled and problems that need to be addressed. This clear image of yours assists you in accomplishing your business objectives and aims. Based on facts and data gathered in the previous phase, a strategy is formed with some prioritized objectives and goals. This activity will also require some budget at your disposal and resources to plan and formulate the strategy.

To carry out this planning activity: strategic mapping has proved to be an effective tool that lets you visualize your plan for the gaps and help you to bridge the gaps.

As this planning phase ends, your company must have a list of objectives, some measurable goals, and a sequence of steps to implement each and move toward your goals and objectives. Hence strategy formulation is the phase where a company reaches the most suitable course of action and the appropriate strategy to accomplish its mission.

3. Strategy Implementation/ Execute Your Plan

Now you have planned according to your business requirements and considering your current market standing. This planning, known as strategic formulation, must be executed and implemented in this third phase. It is the practical phase where your organization brings in the change and starts embarking upon the journey of achieving your aims and goals. So, once your organization has the plan, you should first communicate the entire plan to your employees and other stakeholders through documentation or meetings and start acting upon it.

Team responsibilities are communicated through KPI (Key performance indicator) dashboards. It lets you track each step and operation carried out while executing the plan, and every step has an owner to keep track of what has been done. In his way, clear and transparent implementation of the plan can be done, bringing the anticipated change.

4. Strategy Evaluation/ Review and Revise the Plan

As your organization has implemented the plan, now is the time to review, evaluate and revise it according to its outcomes.

As the primary purpose of strategic planning is an ongoing improvement, your organization needs to revisit the plan to monitor the performance after implementing the plan. Monitoring the plan lets your organization adjust the plan according to the gaps you observed or something that needs to be changed according to your specific business requirement. Here, you implement checkpoints into your schedule to keep what is working fine and which part is hindering the growth.

Strategy evaluation includes setting and regulating benchmarks as required, congregating feedback, and gauging performance. The consequences of strategy evaluation can aid in creating best practices and future strategies. It also helps you evaluate your priorities based on current and past failures.

Conclusion

To start making measurable advancements and progress toward accomplishing your organization’s vision, you need to monitor your strategic plan constantly and iteratively update it. By doing so, your organization would not b weakened by competition. Instead, you can maintain your long-term outlook and perspective, you can make decisions that can aid you to remain on the path of success, and it will keep your market standing intact or even make it better.