Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Facilitating Strategic Planning Meetings: A Strategy Consultant's Guide
    Facilitating Strategic Planning Meetings: A Strategy Consultant's Guide
    Facilitating Strategic Planning Meetings: A Strategy Consultant's Guide
    Ebook133 pages1 hour

    Facilitating Strategic Planning Meetings: A Strategy Consultant's Guide

    By Bill Birnbaum

    ()

    Read preview

    About this ebook

    The person responsible for facilitating a strategic planning meeting faces a multi-dimensional challenge. Certainly, he or she must keep the planning team on track so that their resultant product is a viable, implementable strategic plan. The facilitator must also assure that a room full of highly opinionated individuals will set aside their day-to-day tasks to focus on their organization’s most critical, long-term issues. And often, the facilitator must guide the planning team’s discussion of critically important, though highly sensitive issues.

    This is the challenge which author Bill Birnbaum faced in 1980 when he launched his strategy consulting practice. As there existed no book which would help him navigate this complex challenge, he developed a number of his own methodologies. Since 1980, he has successfully used those methodologies to facilitate strategic planning meetings for hundreds of client organizations. It’s ironic in a way, that a third of a century later, Bill has written the book which he searched for in 1980. Here you have, in some 24,000 words and 20 diagrams, the essence of what Bill has learned in successfully facilitating strategic planning meetings during these last three decades.

    From this book, you will learn:
    •The one question to ask at the very start of your strategic planning meeting – to initiate lively, strategic-level discussions among your planning team members.
    •How to get your strategic planning team to focus on their organization’s key strategic issues and avoid getting bogged down in tactical details.
    •The two criteria to use in determining whether or not a suggested internal strength is really an internal strength – so that the strength can later be successfully used to support your strategy.
    •How to be sure that a suggested internal weakness is really an internal weakness. For all too often strategic planning teams confuse weaknesses with symptoms of weaknesses. Remember – you can‘t fix a symptom. And before you can fix a weakness, you first have to identify that weakness.
    •A valuable tool for consolidating your strategic planning team’s diverse opinions about their organization’s mission statement. In fact, you’ll learn how to facilitate your planning team’s development of their mission statement in three hours or less.
    •How to avoid the common mistake of confusing an external opportunity with a strategy.
    •How much detail to include in your strategies. For too much detail will present a problem; too little detail will present a worse problem.
    •Why and how to challenge your planning team members when they’re setting due dates for their strategies.
    •A suggested table of contents of the written strategic plan.
    •Options for communicating the resultant strategic plan to others in the organization.

    This book serves as a guide for those responsible for facilitating strategic planning meetings. You’ll find it to be equally helpful for both the internal “strategic planning person,” and the external strategy consultant. Whether internal or external, the facilitator faces the multi-dimensional challenge of guiding the organization’s strategic planning team through the process of developing a viable, implementable strategic plan. Bill Birnbaum’s time-tested methodologies will be of help to you.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBill Birnbaum
    Release dateApr 11, 2016
    ISBN9781932632040
    Facilitating Strategic Planning Meetings: A Strategy Consultant's Guide
    Author

    Bill Birnbaum

    For over three decades, I’ve worked with senior management teams helping them develop a shared strategic vision for their organization and then turn that vision into a sound business strategy. For 20 years, I published and edited the Business Strategies Newsletter. I’ve authored a number of strategy books including “Strategic Thinking: A Four Piece Puzzle,” currently in its fifth printing. Also for 20 years, I taught strategy courses for the American Management Association including: •The Strategic Planning Course •Strategy Implementation (I developed this course for the AMA) •Thinking and Managing Strategically I also developed The Strategic Planning WorkshopTM, a hands-on program to prepare senior management teams to develop their strategic plan. I’ve conducted that program for hundreds of organizations and thousands of senior and mid-level managers. I’ve served on the board of directors for three high-growth corporations, all of which were acquired per the plan I help them develop. •ISR Corporation •Trans-met Engineering •Woodroof Laboratories I’m certified as a Certified Management Consultant (CMC) by the Institute of Management Consultants. I hold a Bachelor’s Degree in Electrical Engineering and a Master’s Degree in Business Administration. In 2007, I lived and worked as a business consultant in Abancay, Peru, helping entrepreneurs and university students stimulate economic development in this poor region of the Peruvian Andes. I lectured at both UNAMBA and UTEA Universities and wrote for Nuevo Management Journal. I speak, read and write Spanish, and have traveled extensively in Spain, Mexico and South America. Now semi-retired, I work with a few select clients from time to time. I continue to write on the subject of business strategy development and implementation and also offer critique of strategic plans and strategic planning processes.

    Read more from Bill Birnbaum

    Related to Facilitating Strategic Planning Meetings

    Related ebooks

    Strategic Planning For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      The Big Lies of Strategy

      Sep 1, 2018

      The Big Lies of Strategy
      7 min read

    • Article

      A Refreshed Vision And Refocused Strategic Pillars

      Jun 18, 2017

      After my first month stepping in from the Marketing Association (MA) board to be the acting CEO, I’ve been focused on bringing to life the strategic plan that was developed in conjunction with many stakeholders. I’d like to take this opportunity to s

      4 min read

    • Article

      How to Become a More Strategic Leader

      Sep 1, 2019

      MY CAREER AT FACEBOOK started in 2006 as its first intern. Three years later, I became a rookie manager at the age of 25. Today, I manage an organization of hundreds of people. This journey has brought countless new challenges, mistakes and lessons.

      5 min read

    • Article

      Find Your Creative FLOW

      Jun 13, 2022

      Find Your Creative FLOW
      9 min read

    • Article

      The Road Best Travelled

      Feb 25, 2018

      The Road Best Travelled
      3 min read

    • Article

      Meetings Are Miserable

      Nov 17, 2022

      Meetings Are Miserable
      5 min read

    • Article

      HOW'S YOUR SALES & MARKETING STRATEGY PROGRESSING?

      Oct 19, 2022

      How do you know if your sales and marketing strategy is going to work? First things first - do you have one? Because defining a strategy is the start of the process. Then you have to be confident it will work. And finally, you need to prove that it w

      2 min read

    • Article

      4 Steps to Leadership

      Sep 1, 2022

      4 Steps to Leadership
      3 min read

    • Article

      4 Steps to Effectively Transition or Sell Your Business

      Jun 17, 2019

      Did you know 70% to 80% of middle-market, closely held businesses put on the market do not sell? And 83% of businesses lack a formal, written transition plan? I've had many discussions with middle-market business owners about planning for the future

      3 min read

    • Article

      Q & A

      Sep 1, 2021

      The pandemic has made stress and anxiety familiar terms for just about everyone. But what does a true case of burnout look like? Part of the problem with the burnout conversation is that we often misapply the word, or use it too loosely. The World He

      9 min read

    Related categories

    Reviews for Facilitating Strategic Planning Meetings

    0 ratings

    0 ratings0 reviews

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

      Book preview

      Facilitating Strategic Planning Meetings - Bill Birnbaum

      Facilitating Strategic Planning Meetings:

      A Strategy Consultant’s Guide

      Bill Birnbaum

      Douglas Mountain Publishing

      www.DouglasMountain.com

      Facilitating Strategic Planning Meetings:

      A Strategy Consultant’s Guide

      Copyright 2016 William S. Birnbaum

      ISBN: 978-1-932632-04-0

      All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system without the written permission of the publisher.

      Contents

      Introduction

      Opening Remarks

      Overview of the Strategic Planning Process

      Your Role as Facilitator

      KSF – The Surprise Question

      Situation Analysis – Where are we today?

      Developing Your Mission Statement

      Setting Quantified Objectives – Where do we wish to arrive, and when?

      Planning Assumptions

      Strategies – How do we get from here to there?

      The SWOT Matrix™

      About Your Strategies

      Two Critical Closing Questions

      Conclusion

      Appendix A: Frequently Asked Questions about the Mission Statement

      Appendix B: The Written Strategic Plan

      Appendix C: The Opportunity Grid™

      About the Author

      Other Books by Bill Birnbaum

      Introduction

      Back in 1980, when I launched my career as a business strategy consultant, I searched high and low for a book which would guide me in facilitating strategic planning meetings. Sadly, and surprisingly, I found nothing of value.

      Oh sure, I found books offering a very general overview of strategic planning. Suggesting that the process begin with an examination of the organization’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. And suggesting that the planning team develop a mission statement.

      But I found nothing that aided the facilitator in:

      Convincing a team of five, seven or eleven highly-opinionated people to set aside their tactical, day-to-day concerns and instead think strategically about the longer-term issues of their organization

      Getting the planning team to deal constructively with very important, though highly sensitive issues

      Consolidating the planning team’s diverse opinions about their organization’s mission statement

      Getting the planning team to focus on key strategic issues and avoiding getting bogged down in tactical details

      So without the aid of such a guide, I moved ahead on my own. During these last 36 years, I’ve accumulated a vast experience working with thousands of executives in hundreds of organizations. Through facilitation of their strategic planning meetings, I helped all to develop a viable, implementable strategic plan.

      This extensive experience has taught me valuable lessons. Yes, I adapted tried and true methodologies like team planning and consensus building. But more importantly, I developed many of my own methodologies. Each of these methodologies I’ll share with you in this book. In fact, this is the book I had hoped to find 36 years ago. It’s ironic in a way, that a third of a century later, I’ve written the book that I searched for back in 1980. Here you have, in some 24,000 words and 18 descriptive diagrams, the essence of what I’ve learned while facilitating strategy sessions during the last three and a half decades.

      This book will serve as a guide for those responsible for facilitating strategic planning meetings. It is equally useful for both the internal strategic planning person, by whatever title, and the external strategy consultant. Either internal or external, the facilitator faces the multi-dimensional challenge of guiding the organization’s strategic planning team through the process of developing a viable, implementable strategic plan. I’m glad that, by sharing my extensive experience, I can be of help to you.

      A couple of notes:

      First, to avoid your having to repeatedly wade through reading he or she and him and her, throughout the book, I’ve instead written he and him.

      Second, prior to reading this book, you’ll benefit from my earlier e-book, "Preparing for Your Strategic Planning Meetings."

      Opening Remarks

      At the opening of your strategy session, the boss person (by whatever title) will likely want to stand up to offer a few introductory remarks. This is certainly appropriate. The boss may want to talk briefly about the organization’s recent history and to highlight its current challenges. He might also mention the importance of the strategic planning process in facing those challenges. Finally, he should also mention that strategic planning is a participatory process and that he’d like to see, and expects to see, a significant contribution from everyone in the room. Of course the boss will also want to say welcome and thanks to all on the planning team for providing input and for devoting their valuable time to the strategic planning process.

      Comments by others?

      Some planning teams like to launch their strategy meeting by asking all of the planning team members to express their expectations for the meeting. While this may be interesting, I don’t think that it’s especially productive. It’s up to you as the facilitator to guide their expectations. Offer them an overview of the process, tell them what they’ll be discussing during each of their three meeting days and get rolling. Sure, some planning teams will want to start their meeting by having everyone say a few words. And if that’s the case, you’ll have to go along with it. But I wouldn’t encourage it and if you have to deal with it, try to make it brief.

      Your opening remarks

      Following the boss’s opening remarks, you, as the facilitator, will need to introduce the planning team to the process in which they’re about to participate. You’ll find that the next section of this book, Overview of the Strategic Planning Process, offers the introduction which you can thus use.

      Overview of the Strategic Planning Process

      Launch your strategic planning meeting with an overview of the process in which your planning team is about to engage. You can begin this overview by explaining that strategic planning addresses the three key questions:

      Where are we today?

      Where do we wish to arrive, and when?

      How do we get from here to there?

      On one of your two flipchart easels, draw the diagram as in Figure 1, below. (Note: As I explain in my earlier e-book, "Preparing for Your Strategic Planning Meeting: Ten Steps to Success," you’ll benefit from using two, rather than one, flipchart easels while facilitating your strategic planning meeting.)

      The Strategic Planning Process

      Explain that the process steps which address these three key questions are, respectively:

      Situation Analysis (which addresses the first question, Where are we today?)

      Objective Setting (which addresses the second question, Where do we wish to arrive, and when?)

      Strategizing (which addresses the third question, (How do we get from here to there?)

      Also explain that these three process steps, plus the additional process step of developing a mission statement, constitute the essence of the strategic planning process. These then are the process steps which your team will deal with during your strategic planning meetings.

      Briefly mention that the situation analysis consists of identifying the organization’s internal strengths and internal weaknesses plus external opportunities and external threats. Point to the block diagram (see Figure 1, above) while reminding the group that situation analysis is the process step which addresses the first key question, Where are we today? A brief mention will do at this point, for when you later

      Enjoying the preview?
      Page 1 of 1