Strategic & Operational Planning

Strategic Planning is a misunderstood and often misused term, lacking a well-defined and widely agreed upon definition. Strategy, and the planning associated with it, has origins dating back to its military usage as early as the 6th century. In the corporate world, strategic planning generally refers to the defining of the organization’s go-forward plan for the future and accompanying desired outcomes. The spectrum of corporate strategic planning models and processes is broad, and the term has taken on many different connotations over recent decades.

Strategic Planning Defined

Strategic planning is the process of devising a plan of both offensive and defensive actions intended to maintain and build competitive advantage over the competition through strategic and organizational innovation. 

A well-formed corporate strategy lays out the bumper-pads to keep organizational momentum aimed in the proper direction, accomplished through unambiguously expressed strategic goals (outcomes) and operational actions to achieve those strategic organizational outcomes. 

At a minimum, for strategic planning to yield competitive advantage, it must address three key questions:

• "What do we do?"
• "Who are our customers?"
• "How do we do what we do better than our competitors?"

Operational Planning Defined

Well-implemented strategic planning provides the vision, direction and goals for the organization, but operational planning translates that strategy into the everyday execution tactics of the business that will ultimately produce the outcomes defined by the strategy. 

Operational planning is the conversion of strategic goals into managed execution.

White Paper

Read our Strategic Planning White Paper to gain insight into the origins and history of strategic planning as well as how more effectively apply it and improve the process in your organization.  Explore more reasons why Method Frameworks is the right choice for your organization.

 

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Do not miss these two important downloads for executives and business strategy professionals.