When I began telling people that I wanted to be a strategic planner, I got a lot of lackluster responses. So much so that it made me question, “What am I doing?” I panicked! How am I supposed to sell my services when everyone seems to just stare at me blankly? What don’t they get? Is it me?
Then my mom so kindly said, “I don’t think a lot of people know what strategic planning is.” Ohhhh. Passion blurred my vision, and it did not even cross my mind that people may not know what it is or why it’s purposeful. Let me tell you!
There are two sides to business: people and operations. Business does not exist if there are no people to operate it. Right? I mean, our crops don’t grow themselves! (Productively, anyway.)
Strategic planning aligns your human resources with your tactical operations to cohesively move your business forward. It’s an honest and holistic analysis of strengths and weaknesses, opportunities and threats, financial capability, short-term and long-term goals (and their feasibility), business and employee performance, company culture, and data reporting. A good strategic plan should also have a succession plan. And a good strategic planner will ensure you have the tools to adequately develop your leaders.
That’s where we can help! Beyond strategic planning, we offer leadership development and coaching services. You can have the best plan in the world, but you will not achieve your goals if you don’t have the right people in the right places to help you achieve them – or accountability at the highest levels to implement.
It can be hard to see the forest through the trees. Sometimes, it does require an outsider to provide that 30,000 foot perspective. A strategic planner will guide you forward utilizing a map (operations) and a compass (people) to move your business to its desired destinations.