The leaves are falling off the trees again and we have to write strategic plans for the coming year. A nice job, however often dull work in this depressing season. And there is never anything done with those plans. Why should you write anything down at all? You have all ideas and actions in your mind…
In addition to the fact that I don’t find autumn a depressing season, your strategic planning does not have to be a nasty job. Smart models and trendy cloud-it enable you to make compact 1A4 plans in co-creation with your team and to organize a tight action follow-up. This makes strategic planning a funny and continuous process that benefits you all year round.
In my daily conversations with entrepreneurs I often hear:
- We have a lot of ideas, but one way or the other, far too few ideas became reality;
- Strategy should be with the directors, but it takes us a lot of time to convince the rest of the team of our plans;
- The investors with whom we are going to start exploring a cooperation would like to see well-documented plans;
- Every time again the strategic actions fale, mostly because we are swallowed up by the hectic pace of everyday life.
These are issues where good strategic planning and disciplined action follow-up have great value. Both in coöperation with your team:
- Choose the team you need to start the planning with and to create huge engagement within the organization;
- Select the strategic model that fits your issue such as the OGSM of the Business model canvas;
- Use the strategic model to ask each other the right questions;
- Dare to ask, be critical and look honestly at yourself and your environment.
Write down the core in your 1A4 strategic plan, including the action points.
Whether it’s spring or fall, in all seasons you and your team should regularly take up your plan, check the status of the actions, fine-tune the ambitions and plan new actions again. Never a dull moment!
To make such a strategic planning proces possible, Your own Venture introduces the online Strategy Builder platform. Using this tool, strategic planning and even the action follow-up become fun again. With engagement of your whole team!