Deep Dive: Strategic Planning for Making Your Vision Happen
6 strategic planning tools - SWOT, SOAR, NOISE, and many more.
Let me ask you a chicken and an egg question. What was first: “Strategic planning or leadership?”
Your gut feeling might tell you that leadership is about defining a purpose and direction. Leaders you remember did a good job establishing objectives and goals that aligned with the vision and mission.
Strategic planning improves collaboration and helps people share responsibility. Leadership can’t work without strategic planning. It is so important. Yet, many leaders do not have time to sit down and plan. Pf!
As Stephen Covey said:
“Most of us spend too much time on what is urgent and not enough time on what is important.”
Use tools to start planning. They will help simplify problems. Begin relevant conversations in your business and team context.
Contents:
4 quadrants tools
SWOT
SOAR
NOISE
Other tools
SCORE
PESTLE
Porter’s 5 Forces
Wrap up
1. SWOT
SWOT (alias strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats) is a typical tool people think of when they hear strategic planning. While it is not entirely clear who its author was (perhaps Albert Humprey), people have been doing SWOT since the 60s.
SWOT analysis has survived over time. It is a straightforward present evaluation of internal/external and positive/negative influences.
Use it when you have a clear question and search for answers. It is useful when you want to align with your team. When you have a new project or face a new problem. Example situations are expanding into new markets, new service design, or new competitors emerging.
To make the most of SWOT, you need to:
Be realistic about the current start of your company, team, or problem.
All points should be specific and based on facts.
All ideas should be positioned well within the diagram into respective categories.
Keep the big picture in mind as too many details can dilute the outcomes.
Treat it as a guide that can spark conversation, align your team, and move forward together.
How to do SWOT:
Filling out the quadrants seems easy, but you need a good understanding of your internal and external environment. Identify well what is positive and negative.
For internal aspects, consider your organizational culture, budget, capacity planning, knowledge bank, etc. For external factors, think about the economy, customers’ preferences, competitors, and market research.
Yet, SWOT isn’t perfect. So be aware of its pros and cons when using it for your strategic planning.
Pros:
It is simple.
It can start a discussion about strategic planning.
It can be used for various problems and situations.
Low cost (no need to hire a consultant or buy software to do it)
Cons:
It does not evaluate the past or future.
It oversimplifies complex problems.
It can’t work in isolation since it does not drive strategic actions and next steps. Discussions, frameworks, and brainstorming are needed.
It is time-consuming but also quickly outdated. Information ages or there are unforeseen problems and obstacles not tackled in the chart.
2. SOAR Analysis
SOAR also takes into account strengths and opportunities. But it does add aspirations and results. It combines data about the current state with where the company wants to be. The difference to SWOT is that SOAR is more forward-thinking and focuses on establishing a vision.
The goal of this strategic planning tool is to benefit from existing strengths and how to allocate your resources. It is a positive and action-driven tool that anyone across the organization can use. Use it for your growth!
How to do SOAR:
Similarly to SWOT, you’re filling quadrants with regards to current and future state and internal and external environment. Ask questions such as:
Strengths: What works?
What does your team do well? What are your current strengths?
What is your greatest achievement? What is your unique selling proposition (UPS)?
What do you do better than your competitors?
Opportunities: What is available?
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