Best Practices : How to Optimize Strategic Planning for Improved Results

In this week’s episode, Tracy Eames, CEO of TEAMES & CO is talking about optimizing your strategic planning process. Do you ever feel like you are always strategic planning? You start in August, and you have customer discovery, stakeholder surveys, data reporting, program/product assessments as you start creating forecasts for what next year could look like.

And that usually ends up being a 200 tab Excel file, right. There is the forecast and the reforecast and the re-reforecast and so on down the line. And this takes a lot of time, right? It usually takes most of our Q3 and a lot of our Q4 because we sit in meeting rooms, especially the senior leadership.

The worst part is that if you are setting strategy in Q3 & Q4, it means you are not setting goals until midway through Q1, and you are already behind the ball. How are teams expected to execute on the annual plan if they do not have goals until March.

Today we talk about how you can streamline this process and help your teams be set up for success at the beginning of the year.

Show Highlights:

• Highlight (01:01) -Tracy sets the stage for how annual and strategic planning is typically done at companies and why this causes a problem.
• Highlight (03:07) - Tracy shares how an planning process that is not optimized has a trickle down effect on goal setting and execution.
• Highlight (05:19) - Time for Best Practices - Tracy shares a few best practices about how you can optimize your strategic planning process.
• Highlight (8:35) - How companies stunt their growth with too many priorities
• Highlight (10:53) - Not only will your team need goals, but do they have development plans? How creating these help you get ahead of the game.
• Highlight (13:13) - What could annual planning look like in a company poised for growth?

Related Links:

• Learn more about how TEAMES & CO builds effective and empowered teams that deliver results at https://www.teamesandco.com/
• Follow TEAMES & CO on Facebook LinkedIn, Twitter (@teamesandco) and Instagram (@teamesandco)
• Want to watch the podcasts on video visit TEAMES & CO on YouTube.

Views expressed by guests are their own and may not reflect the views of TEAMES & CO. Mention of particular products or services and participation of a guest does not imply an endorsement by TEAMES & CO. The information provided is for educational and entertainment purposes and should not be taken as professional advice.

Our podcast is edited by Nodderly (www.nodderly.com). A huge thank you to their team for the great video, audio and editing support!