April 1, 2022

Strategic Plan

Strategic planning in the past 20 years has achieved a kind of mystical status in leadership literature. Informed that heretofore their plans have been "tactical, not strategic at all" and too often "left collecting dust on the shelf," schools pore over HBR think pieces and try to imagine the "generative thinking" that will bring them to the higher consciousness these pieces never quite nail down, or offer examples from corporate endeavors that lack moral imperative--would the history of humanity be altered in any substantive way if Nike never existed?--or that, we learn five years later, went up in flames.

In our experience, with solid guidance, most schools arrive at the plans their schools need. At many schools, particularly those for whom enrollment is a yearly challenge, much of the strategic plan becomes focused on essential elements of operations--program, hiring, professional development, student support. The resources needed for these efforts become part of a larger strategic effort, but these key drivers of student recruitment and retention (and fundraising, for that matter) should be in the plan. That they be inspiring, innovative and help the school differentiate itself from its competitors, even better.

Solid guidance, of course, is a neat throw away line. We find that schools that create plans without outside support often arrive at good final products that don't get lasting traction because they're built on incomplete or shaky research and a process that fails to socialize the plan. Fairly or unfairly, one or several constituencies wind up calling it the "head's plan." Schools that convince a local management professor or consultant to provide a pro bono Saturday workshop get an even less effective plan, as too often, no one really owns the rest of the process. 

Some irony then that a consultant recommends using consultants for strategic planning. Nevertheless, as I describe in a recent piece on using consultants, finding the right consultants for the work can provide value that exceeds the initial sting of the fees. We're convinced that the planning process is just as important as the final product, and in our work as consultants and heads, finding experienced consulting help is the key to achieving both.