Strategic Thinking for Communities Without a Planning Director UJC General Assembly November 2002

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Strategic Thinking for Communities Without a
Planning DirectorUJC General AssemblyNovember
2002

• Leslie Robin
• Consulting Services
• United Jewish Communities
• leslie.robin_at_ujc.org

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Outline

• Strategic Planning Model
• Creating a vision
• Creating a mission
• Conducting an Environmental Scan
• Formulating Issues Goals
• Developing Action Steps
• Monitoring and Evaluating

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Keeping Perspective

• Real benefit is the process
• No perfect plan or process
• Series of Small moves
• Things are not that bad
• Punctuated Equilibrium

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• KEEP IT SIMPLE!

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Strategic Planning
Strategic Planning is a dynamic process that is
flexible enough to allow and even encourage
modification of plans in order to respond to
changing circumstances.
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The 8 Step Strategic Planning Model
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Step 1Preplanning and Organization

• Reasons
• Readiness
• Politics
• Leadership
• Stakeholders
• Resources
• Plan for Planning

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Step 2 - aVisioning

• Breaks out of boundary thinking
• Encourages openness to unique and creative
  solutions
• Creates Excitement

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Vision Killers

• Tradition
• Fear of Ridicule
• Complacent stakeholders
• Fatigued Leaders
• Short-Term thinking
• Naysayers

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• It is five years from today. How will you
  describe your community?

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• Step 2 -b
• Mission Statement
• The concept of the organization, the nature of
  the business in which it is involved, why the
  organization exists, who it serves, and its
  guiding principles and values.
• "What good, for whom, at what cost"

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Creating A Mission Statement

• Say who you are, what you do, what you stand for
  and why you do and not another organization
• Not a slogan or public relations piece.
• Simplicity, honesty and frankness not setting the
  world on fire
• Maximum of 3-4 sentences long
• Takes time - at least a week or two
• Examine others

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Process

• Convene leadership
• Review existing mission statement
• Brainstorm - who, what, why
• Consolidate similar ideas
• Prioritize ideas
• Test ideas with other groups
• Write into statement
• Retest

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Step 3Data Collection And Trend Analysis
Methods

• Existing Data Bases
• Techniques - "SWOT" Analysis
• Demographic Data
• Benchmarking
• Interviews
• Focus Groups

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Rules Of Thumb

• Never enough data
• World's new knowledge doubles every 18 months
• Recognize and accept the value of intuition
• Information that can be used
• Appoint someone to tell us when enough is enough
• Engage key Stakeholders

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SWOT Analysis Worksheet

• Strengths
• _______________________________________
• _______________________________________
• _______________________________________
• Weaknesses
• _______________________________________
• _______________________________________
• _______________________________________
• Opportunities
• _______________________________________
• _______________________________________
• _______________________________________
• Threats
• _______________________________________
• _______________________________________
• _______________________________________

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Step 5 - aGoals

• Defines the shared outcomes
• How vision will be attained
• Can have short term and long term

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Basics of Identifying Goals

• Brainstorm
• Group
• Consensus on the top 3 to 5 issues
• Review against the Mission and Vision
• Focus on achievability
• Clearly articulated

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Four Questions Technique
I. What are you trying to achieve? II. What are
you trying to preserve? III. What are you trying
to avoid? IV. What are you trying to eliminate?
No Do we have it? Yes
Yes No Do we want it?
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Four Questions Technique Worksheet
No Do we have it? Yes
Yes No Do we want it?
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Time Management Matrix
Urgent Not Urgent
Important Not Important
Important - Valuable and contributes to your
vision and mission Urgent - Requires immediate
attention
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Step 5 -bObjectives

• Result or outcome that move toward the goals
• Specific and measurable
• Tangible and achievable in a specific time period

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Step 6Developing an Action Plan

• Who will be involved?
• What must be done?
• When will it take place?
• Where will actions be preformed?
• Why are these actions being taken?
• How are the task to be preformed

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Action Plan Worksheet
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Step 7 Approval and Dissemination

• Distribution Plan
• Communications Plan
• Full report and executive summary
• Target groups
• Board Approval

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• CELEBRATE!
• Then

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Step 8Annual Monitoring Process

• Is the Plan on target?
• What has or has not been accomplished?
• Have the accomplishments help further the
  mission?
• Are the environmental assumptions valid?
• Have the major issues changed?
• Should new objectives or targets be established?

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Mid-Course Corrections are OK