Strategic Planning and Management What is Strategic Management?
Strategic planning is a process to provide direction and meaning to day-to-day activities. It examines an organization's values, current status, and environment, and relates those factors to the organization's desired future state, usually expressed in five- to ten-year time periods. The organization may be a program, school, school district, public or private agency, or any other institution that wishes to control its future.
If the organization existed in a static environment in which no change was necessary or desired, there would be no need for strategic planning. But, our environment is changing -demographically, economically, and culturally. Thus, strategic
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Once consensus is reached, the practical steps necessary for reaching that future state over a given period of time - the goals and objectives of the organization can be identified and actualized in the implementation phase. Evaluation and revision occur at the end of the planning cycle, but may occur at any stage with in the planning process.
Why Do It?
In the simplest terms, a strategic plan can help improve performance. School staff or members of any organization, can become so bogged down in routine functioning and daily challenges, they can lose sight of the organization's purpose. A strategic plan cannot only refocus members' sense of purpose, but can stimulate future-oriented thinking based on a shared sense of mission. Collaboration between members of an organization is more effective when everyone is working with in the same set of assumptions and toward the same goals.
Today's educational system must cope with changes in demographics, family patterns, and workplace requirements. Many of these changes provide interrelated challenges to the system. Viewing them as a web of problems may be overwhelming; putting them in the perspective of an organized strategic plan allows the organization to deal with them in a coordinated way, addressing pieces of the problems as part of a progression toward a total solution.(3) This allows the organization to influence its environment and take control of its future, rather than reacting to
A strategic plan is a tool that delivers guidance in achieving a mission or goal with maximum proficiency and control for an organization. Strategic planning is used to transform and revitalize organizations. The plan helps provide an inclusive understanding of opportunities and challenges both internally and externally for the organization. The plan delivers an assessment of the strengths and limitations that are realistic within the company. A well-developed strategic plan will offer a comprehensive approach and empowerment for the stakeholders involved. It is an opportunity for learning and understanding priorities that will drive the business to succeed. Jones (2010), describes how in health care organizations, strategic plans
"Strategic management is a set of managerial decisions and actions that determine the long-run performance of a corporation" (Wheelen & Hunger, 2006, p.3). The benefits of strategic management helps the firm focus on the objectives and develop the steps involved in obtaining the vision and financial wealth of the organization. An effective strategic management plan should include the following three questions: (1) Where is the organization now? (2) If no changes are
Strategic planning within a company is a tool used in companies that help mature areas in total quality management. This type of planning creates a cohesive management system for lower level employees to better adapt in. “Strategic planning determines where an organization is going over the next year or more and how it 's going to get there. Typically, the process is organization-wide, or focused on a major function such as a division, department or other major function”(McNamara, 2008). In order to plan effectively one must first make a clear assessment of the plan and have an analysis on the corporations mission statement and objective.
Strategic planning is an integral process of an organization defining its strategies and direction and making decisions to allocate available resources to peruse laid strategies, which provides the organizations which a competitive edge over their competitors.
Strategic planning is the management activity of an organization to achieve the organization’s goals through setting priorities, focusing activities and resources, working of employees and stakeholders, agreement establishment, and evaluation of the organization’s direction (Balanced Scorecard Institute, 2015).
Strategic planning can dictate the success of any organization if properly planned as well as the failure of an organization if not implemented as planned. Strategic planning is all about making choices. It is a process designed to support leaders in being intentional about their goals and methods. Simply stated, strategic planning is a management tool, and like any management tool, it is used for one purpose only—to help an organization do a better job. This portion of the strategic plan will explain why an
Strategic Planning is the process of developing and maintaining a strategic fit between the organizations goals and capabilities as well as emerging market conditions and opportunities. This process begins with a clear company mission statement. However, this is only a small piece of a dynamic and perpetual process. Other activities involved with strategic planning also include setting supporting organizational objectives, designing a sound product mix as well as coordinating functional strategies. Strategic planning works to set the groundwork for the rest of the subsidiary planning functions in the company.
Strategic planning involves making decisions about the organization’s long-term goals and strategies and how the organization decides to implement their goals (Bateman, Snell, Konopaske, pg. 113). Strategies help organizations to have a clear perspective on how to go about accomplishing the goals they have in place. All organizations have a clear vision of what their mission and purpose as a company is, they know how to fulfill the mission, vision, and purpose and they know how to ensure that they accomplish all their goals. However, the route the organization takes to define these things determines how effective they will be.
Strategic planning is "a disciplined effort to produce fundamental decision and actions that shape and guide what an organization (or other entity) is, what it does, and why it does it" (Herman, The Jossey-Bass Handbook of Nonprofit Leadership and Management, 155)
The strategic management process is sometimes improperly perceived as a unidirectional flow of objectives, strategies and decision parameters from management to the employees. In fact, the process should be highly interactive since it is designed to stimulate input from creative, skilled and knowledgeable people working at every level of the business.
Per John M. Bryson, strategic planning, if properly conducted, can help the leaders and managers of public and non-profit organizations think, learn and act tactically. Strategic planning enables organizational leaders and managers to first identify their organization’s mission and/or purpose. Thereafter, the planning process permits these leaders to pinpoint the actions and activities that will enable the organization to achieve its mission. Finally, the planning process requires the organizational leaders to synthesize objectives and activities into a blueprint or concrete plan of action under which the organization will conduct its business.
According to literature, strategic planning is vital for strategic management. Burgelman (1994) points that strategic planning is a process which decides how, when and who is going to plan and how the results will be implemented. Drucker (1974) identified that the planning for an organization’s future that includes setting major overall objectives, the determination of basic approaches to be used in
Strategic planning is the process of gathering information from stakeholders, market players, professional entity, and government agency. The purpose of gathering information is formulating a realistic and a workable framework that any organization can implement and work with. Evaluation of information is a key aspect in determine the kind of plans that the organization wish to a chive over certain a period. Strategic planning ensures the implementation is, crafted well, and parties involved be acquitted with it. Developing a good Strategic plan helps a company to implement its missions and visions effectively, and helps the company to evaluate
Strategic Planning set the stage for the rest of the planning in the firm. It involves defining a clear company mission, setting supporting company objectives, designing a sound business portfolio and coordinating functional strategies. At corporate level the company first defines its overall purpose and mission.
Strategic planning is an organizational management activity that is used to set priorities, focus energy and resources, strengthen operations, ensure that employees and other stakeholders are working toward common goals,