Video - How to Set and Reach Your Objectives

As a strategic planning speaker I am often asked "How can I implement my strategic plan?"  The short video on this page explains several key parts of the process, based upon 25 years of successful execution of plans in a variety of industries.

http://www.strategyspeakers.com/robert_bradford.php

Strategic Planning - Finding the way forward

These days I seem to be meeting more people who feel strategic planning should take second place to improving sales right now. Unless your company is on the verge of bankruptcy, this opinion is completely misplaced.

Sales can be good or bad for your company. I've seen many situations where big increases in sales have nearly killed a company - and others where the sales that were added were to completely the wrong kind of customer. Both leave you with a bigger problem - that is, your company is bigger, but your problems are bigger, too.

Good strategic planning is about finding a way forward that does not leave you to the mercy of a sometimes capricious economy. In the last two recessions, we had many clients that used the pause in market growth to build substantially sturdier and more profitable businesses. Sadly, I met some people who chose the path of more sales instead of better strategy - and more than half of those people are now out of business. I now expect this to happen to companies that don't have excellent strategies - because recessions have a way of weeding out companies with poor strategy.

Which will you choose? A stronger, stable company - or a bigger, weaker one?

Consider contacting me for a short strategic planning tune-up - even if you already have a plan, you will probably find some valuable ways to improve profitability now.

Strategic Planning - Why your balanced scorecard doesn't work part 4

Your balanced scorecard isn't driving action.

This is most likely true, if you are doing balanced scorecard instead of true strategic planning in your company. Why do I say this? Because true strategic planning focuses attention on the things that will make a difference for your company. Balanced scorecard processes, on the other hand, tend to rely on employee understanding of the links between metrics and reality - and, because of shortcomings I've discussed in earlier posts, these links rarely motivate employees as well as understanding the underlying issues. Granted, your CFO or other technical managers may quickly grasp the relationships - but true strategic competency requires broad participation and support from all parts of the company.

Even if you have excellent training and support throughout the company for balanced scorecard, you are likely to have issues if you are not also driving execution through a routine tool for monitoring and accountability on actions (rather than numbers). The action plan process in Simplified Strategic Planning is an excellent approach to doing this, and can be helpful even if you are not using an optimal strategic planning process. There are several keys to making implementation work - it is, after all, the sore spot in strategic planning for most companies. The most important of these is to have rock solid and unified support for implementation accountability at the top levels of your company. This is a key area where executives must always act as role models for the rest of the organization - failure to do so almost always results in sloppy execution.

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If you are looking for a strategic planning speaker to help your organization learn better strategic planning implementation - or the whole strategic planning process - please check out my strategic planning speaker brochure or see what past clients have said about me at http://www.strategyspeakers.com/p_rwb.asp

Strategic Planning - Can you help me?

Every so often, someone will call or email me and ask "Can you help me with my strategic planning?".

The answer, of course, is YES.

I spend my time doing nothing but strategic planning - and I've spent 20 years paying very close attention to what works and what doesn't work in the strategic planning process.

I speak at trade association meetings, conventions, corporate meetings, and I facilitate planning meetings for companies and associations of all sizes, all over the world.

If you think your strategies could use the fresh perspective of an experienced outsider who does NOTHING BUT STRATEGIC PLANNING - give me a call today!

My direct phone number is 734-665-2971