Five Answers to Successful Strategic Planning

One of the hardest parts of doing strategic planning is just getting started. Where to begin? What approach should we use to pursue strategic planning for my library? Do I just tell the staff; “Next Monday we will have a managers meeting to begin our next strategic plan.” BOOM There it is. We’ve started! Sure. Go ahead and do that – IF YOU WANT TO ENSURE FAILURE.

If you stop to consider what all is in involved in conducting strategic planning, you’ll realize that it may not be the most complicated process, but it does take some deliberate organization and preparation. Expecting your staff to know what needs to be done to pursue a new strategic plan is expecting a lot, unless you have a highly motivated, highly collaborative, visionary and experienced staff. Those dozen or so libraries that meet this description have no worries. For the rest of us…