7 Ways To Improve Your Strategic Planning Skills For Business Growth
There is no shortage of innovation and creativity in the modern workplace. People are more innovative, leaders are evolving, and businesses are looking to set new records. Thus, modern businesses need the aid of some solid strategic planning skills.
Many professionals hold the job title of “strategic planner” or “strategic planning manager.” Still, other jobs need strategic planning skills even though the label “strategic” is not mentioned in the designation.
For managers and leaders, strategic planning is a must-have skill. An efficient strategic thinker starts with mindful marketing strategies. It helps to analyze the big picture and makes project completion easier.
People who need to have strategic planning skills:
- Management Consultants
- Business Developers
- Corporate Developers
- Strategic Cost Analysts
- Operations Analyst
We believe, apart from these job roles, every employee or leader must know strategic planning because it helps to:
- Review the situation
- Understand the challenges
- Set objectives
- Identify strengths and weaknesses
- Prepare for risks
So, let's look at the different types of strategic planning skills and how to boost them. But first, let's review what we need to know:
What Are Strategic Planning Skills?
Strategic planning is nothing but setting a vision for a company and realizing the vision via small, obtainable goals. Strategic planning skills help to set goals, decide on an action plan and increase employee productivity.
Every job requires different skills and experiences, so make sure you read the job profiles carefully. Focus on skills needed and hire accordingly.
Types of Strategic Planning Skills
Now that we know what strategic planning skills are let's discuss the types.
Analytical
Leaders who work in strategic planning must have the ability to analyze and evaluate business plans. They must know market analysis, feasibility analysis, and more.
With an analytical skill, strategic planners can decide the steps a company needs to take, which includes:
- Attention to detail
- Calculating costs for implementation
- Critical thinking
- Logical thinking
- Inductive reasoning
- Deductive reasoning
- Systematic thinking
Communication Skills
Leaders with good strategic planning skills must communicate business plans with their employees. They must clearly explain the action plans to achieve the company goals Along with communication, they must also practice active listening.
Strong communication skills and active listening help in:
- Collaboration
- Constructive criticism
- Negotiation
- Conflict resolution
- Team building
- Teamwork
Leadership
Strategic planning involves strong decision-making. A person with the basic set of leadership skills will spur employees to reach a common goal. They must inspire, motivate and ensure employees’ loyalty towards the organization.
Leadership skills in strategic planning portray:
- Energetic workforce
- Establishes incentives
- Charisma
- Flexibility
- Interpersonal skills
- Motivation
- Recognition
7 Ways to Strengthen your Strategic Planning Skills
The market has become competitive, and you must identify weaknesses (both internal and external) to remain on top. Here are seven ways to master your strategic planning skills.
1. The Big Picture
A data-driven decision is an important step. Especially when you have good data sources and insights, you must gather information before making a strategic plan. This information allows you to see the big picture.
Seeing the big picture is about understanding:
- Your current situation
- What are the available resources?
- What market changes must you anticipate?
- Why must you execute the decisions you’re about to make?
When you understand and are ready for future changes, the company becomes agile. Success is imminent in any situation with meticulous planning and preparation.
2. Define a Process
Strategic planning requires a person to outline the process first. Doing so helps you gain better transparency and awareness of how to achieve your goals. There are many ways to achieve good strategic planning skills, but the Hoshin planning process is the one we suggest.
Hoshin planning has many elements that are effective in today’s market, such as:
- A continuous improvement approach to planning
- It helps in refining your plans and execution
- Emphasizes on leadership
- Assists in communicating common goals
When you understand the Hoshin planning process, you can effectively incorporate other strategic planning methods.
3. Think About Execution
Staying realistic is an essential step to strategic planning. Strategic planning requires a person to outline the process first. Doing so helps you gain better transparency and awareness of how to achieve your goals. This implies bringing the team members to a common ground and taking their input.
The primary aim is to get everyone committed to planning and executing the goal.
The process helps you analyze:
- The need for additional resources
- If there are parts, the team members cannot handle
- Need for new recruitment
- Outsourcing the task if required
One option for outsourcing tasks is to use a staff augmentation service, which can provide skilled professionals to temporarily join your team and help to complete the necessary tasks.
4. Set a Timeframe
Most plans fail because people do not follow a strict timeline. Setting deadlines and following them is a necessary strategic planning process. Make sure you apply deadlines to both long-term and short-term goals.
As you start working on the project and figure out the execution, time management becomes imperative. You must perform these tasks within a specific timeframe. Setting realistic deadlines is crucial to achieving your objectives.
While setting deadlines, you must keep in mind a few things:
- Set realistic deadlines
- Take inputs from employees
- Ensure the deadlines are met
- Encourage teamwork for faster outputs
- Create a room for changes
following these steps will help enhance your leadership qualities and boost the team's success
5. Leave Room for Changes
Creating a detailed plan is essential, but over-planning is not. You must create a space for flexibility and allow your project to be adapted to different situations. You cannot mitigate every risk, so flexibility comes in handy.
Over-planning is a sign of becoming over-ambitious, and this is something you must avoid to eradicate adverse effects. If you set impossible goals, it will affect team motivation and work dynamics.
Believe in your team. Once the plan is set, sit back and look at the progress after a week or so. If the project still looks good, you know; you and your team are on the right track.
6. Rewards are Important
Rewards and recognition are a practical part of strategic planning. Before you finalize the plan, you must announce the rewards to the employees. First, set the milestone your team must achieve. Then balance it by rewarding your employees when they acquire the desired milestone.
Rewards don’t have to be big bonuses or expensive gifts; what matters is appreciation. For example, once they achieve their goals on time, you can give them incentives, time-off, or a simple gift card. This enhances motivation and employee engagement.
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7. Review and Evaluate
Continuous evaluation is an effective process of strategic planning. With technology, reviews and evaluations have become hassle-free. Modern tools help you to get real-time analytics about the progress of your project.
Continuous evaluation is the key to progress. Now we have software helping us collect data and analyzing it faster. One can evaluate the factors concerning every milestone.
Conclusion
Following these seven tips will make you an expert in strategic planning skills. No matter what challenges your company faces, you can achieve the desired goal with a strategic plan.
This article is written by Gautam Gayan. He works as a Content Marketer at Vantage Circle. Apart from being a passionate content creator for HR services and employee engagement, Gautam is a theatre enthusiast, an avid reader and an aspiring poet. For any related queries, contact editor@vantagecircle.com
