Think of your Board of Directors as an Adult Leadership Program

When I was an Executive Director with the YMCAs, I had Program Directors who ran our programs – things like day camp, youth sports, teen leaders, etc. Other organizations probably have similar roles, people who run programs, services, do case management, etc. A couple of months ago I shared an article on effective board meetings. In it, I talked about how I think of the Board of Directors as an Adult Leadership program that the Executive Director leads. 

Our youth programs would teach kids things like teamwork, sportsmanship, and how to develop healthy relationships. Similarly, our Board of Directors helps adults to develop their presentation and collaboration skills, it teaches them how to problem solve and advocate for things that are important to them, and it gives them a connection to their community that they might not otherwise have. 

When we think about our boards in that light, it shifts how we think about the structure, functions and activities of the board. It also helps us shift from a one-way street to a two-way street. If we just think about the board as being there to serve our organization, it’s a one-way street – what can the organization get out of these people? When we consider our work with the board as a two-way street we start to think about how the work engages and develops the members of the board. 

In planning a youth development program, the director needs to consider these components: 

  • Objectives and Purpose
  • Target Audience
  • Program Structure and Activities 
  • Curriculum and Content
  • Resources and Materials
  • Staff and Volunteers
  • Budget and Funding
  • Outreach and Recruitment
  • Evaluation and Assessment
  • Safety and Risk Management 

Let’s look at each and see how these planning components can apply to running an Adult Leadership program, AKA the Board of Directors. 

  • Objectives and Purpose

    • Clarify what you want the organization to get out of the program AND what you want the participants to come away with. Will they experience skills development, personal growth, community engagement, network building, leadership skills, personal fulfillment, etc? 

  • Target Audience

    • Who and what does your organization need in order to advance the work on the cause? Think about the skills, passion, connections, characteristics, and demographics of the people you want on your board. If the people on your board do not possess the qualities that you need, how can you help them to level-up?

  • Program Structure and Activities 

    • What are you going to have your board members do? It’s not enough to just have them come to board meetings for a sit & get. Incorporate opportunities for every board member to speak and contribute. Think about engagement opportunities outside of board meetings; such as committees, task forces, program observations, community outreach, public appearances, and more. Ideas for engaging your volunteers at a higher level:
      • Provide experiential learning to help grow their knowledge of the cause
      • Give them research projects or reading to do and report back to the larger group
      • Have them interview experts in your industry and share their learnings 
      • Give them the opportunity to conduct mission moment interviews and share the impact the organization is having
      • Delegate the facilitation of a discussion topics to someone other than the board chair
      • Additionally: opening thoughts, timekeepers, and committee reports are all roles that volunteers can step into 

  • Curriculum and Content

    • The content of board work should tie back to the mission and strategies of the organization. By including volunteers in strategic planning and tying those plans back to the month-to-month work of the board, you actively engage your board in advancing the mission. In addition, consider the opportunities you are including for your volunteers to grow. You might include:
      • Formal or informal training on things like: board governance, community initiatives, leadership skills, industry trends, etc. 
      • Board mentoring
      • Presentation opportunities
      • Networking 
      • Mission education and connection

  • Resources and Materials

    • This involves ensuring that your volunteers have the information available to do their job as a board member effectively. That can include an onboarding process, access to historical information, agendas and reading materials distributed in advance, and staff or volunteer support.

  • Staff and Volunteers

    • In order to ensure that the adult leadership program is effective, it requires staff or volunteer monitoring. Often the Executive Director is the leader who ensures that the program runs according to design. A Board Development committee or a Board Governance committee can (and should) help with planning, executing, and evaluating the work of the board. 

  • Budget and Funding

    • Just like with any other program, potential expenses need to be considered. Do you need to rent space for meetings, provide meals or snacks, purchase name tags or shirts, host socials, etc? Meals or other refreshments can serve as a great strategy for bringing people together and providing informal networking. 

  • Outreach and Recruitment

    • I hardly ever talk to a nonprofit leader that doesn’t ask me how they can find and recruit good board members. It’s important to acknowledge the fact that a professional and highly productive board can be one of your best attraction and retention tools. When people are excited about serving on your board and they believe their time is being used valuably, they will want to get others involved. And, the opposite is true. If meetings are unproductive and poorly organized, they can repel prospective board members.

  • Evaluation and Assessment

    • Again, this is often led by the Executive Director, and it is great to enlist the Board Development committee with this process. Good questions for the group to discuss include:
      • How effective was our last meeting?
      • Did we engage all members?
      • Are volunteers actively contributing?
      • What can we do to make the next one better? 
      • Are there any “off-line” conversations that need to happen? 
      • Are we meeting our objectives in regards to adult leadership development? 
      • Are we moving the needle on the work of the board towards our strategic objectives? 

  • Safety and Risk Management 

    • Serving on a board is usually a fairly low risk program in terms of physical safety. Unlike providing swimming or camping programming! To make sure that your volunteers are protected, all agencies should carry Directors & Officers (D&O) insurance. Additionally, ensuring that you create a culture where it is safe for people to step outside their comfort zone is key to helping them grow. No one grows when they do not feel safe. 

There’s no question that our best volunteers are the ones who give their time and energy to our organization out of a passion and desire to give back. And that is still super important. But if we are only thinking about what we can get out of our board members, rather than what we can give them, we are missing an opportunity to further develop the adult leaders we interact with and who care about making our world a better place. 

Every nonprofit is different and has unique needs and challenges. Email me at Kim@Athena-CoCo.com, or schedule a Discovery Call if you would like to discuss your organization’s Adult Leadership Program. 

Kim is a mom, lover of being active and the outdoors, and helper of nonprofit leaders.
kim@athena-coco.com 

 

Strategic Plan vs Operating Plan

Planning is everything

Everyone thinks they need a Strategic Plan. And sometimes they do. But not always. Often what an organization really needs is an Operating Plan to effectively drive their work. This article will share when a Strategic Plan is appropriate, when an Operating Plan is a better option, and what a solid Operating Plan looks like. Let’s dig in. 

Strategic Planning

Strategic planning is an organization’s process of defining its overriding direction for achieving its mission or purpose. A business uses this process to make decisions on how it will allocate its resources to pursue their strategies. 

The general outcome of a strategic planning process is a Strategic Plan. This can be anything from a one-page visual to a binder full of documents, information, and goals. The trap many businesses fall into is believing that the point of strategic planning is to get to the Strategic Plan. In reality, the most important part of the process is engaging stakeholders, volunteers, constituents and staff in the activity of examining the organization. 

Gathering information and input from multiple sources ensures a business or organization is staying relevant and on track for fulfilling its purpose. Through this process leaders learn what is important to the community, their customers, and those people closest to the products or services of the business. In order for a strategic planning session to be effective, leaders must be open to change and willing to let go of the past. Otherwise, there is no reason to go through the work of strategic planning. 

Another pitfall of strategic planning is to create a beautiful plan, then leave it sitting on a shelf or in a drawer. Again, if you are going to go to all the work of strategic planning and then you don’t use it to guide the work of your business, you have just wasted a bunch of time and energy. This can also serve to disengage your most loyal allies. 

When Not to do a Strategic Plan

While the strategic planning process can be a very valuable tool for guiding your work, there are several reasons NOT to do it. 

  1. First and foremost, if done right, the strategic planning process takes a significant amount of time, energy, and money. If you do not have the time, determination, or funds to do it right, you are better off not doing it halfway. 
  2. A business that falls under the guidance of a parent organization probably does not need to go through a strategic planning process. Usually the parent organization sets the strategy. In that case, your operation is responsible for figuring out how you will execute those strategies for your service area. 
  3. A business that already has effective and relevant strategies in place does not need to go through the process. There’s no right or wrong answer to how often you should go through the strategic planning process. A general rule of thumb is every 3 to 5 years. If you are actively using your strategic plan and reviewing, the need for a new planning process will organically reveal itself. 
  4. When a business uses Strategy Screens (you can read more about this concept here), they go through the process of examining their strategies every time they are faced with an opportunity or challenge. Similarly to number 3, by using this system you will know when it’s time to go through a strategic planning process. It won’t be dictated by the cycle of the calendar. 
  5. As stated above, if leadership is not ready for the potential to make significant changes, then its probably not a good time to embark on a strategic planning process. This can happen because of egos, protecting turf, and special interests. In these cases, it doesn’t matter how fantastic a plan is, it’s unlikely to result in any real change. 
  6. Other reasons for not engaging in strategic planning include a lack of understanding of the purpose, lack of flexibility, lack of ability to follow-up and a lack of engaged stakeholders. 

Due to the significant investment it takes to do effective strategic planning, you want to be sure it’s the right option at the right time. If you decide that a strategic planning process isn’t right for you, it doesn’t mean you shouldn’t do some sort of planning. That brings us to the value of Operating Plans.

Operating Plans

Strategic planning focuses on how things have changed for your business over the past few years, what’s changing now and what might change in the future. On the other hand, Operations Planning looks at the way you will conduct business over the next year. If you have a Strategic Plan in place, your Operating Plan should be directly tied to it. For businesses that do not have a Strategic Plan, it might be even more important to develop an Operating Plan. 

I recommend some level of Operations Planning every year. The best time to do this is leading up to your budgeting process. A budget is simply a plan for your year, broken down into numbers. In order to put together your numbers plan for the year, you need to know what you will be doing. 

Since most people cannot predict the future, the best we can do is make assumptions about what will happen over the coming year. Then we make plans around those assumptions. Based on your expertise in your industry, you may predict growth, stagnation, or the need to add a new product or service. Taking the time to think through what will happen over the next year, you are able to put together realistic plans. Sometimes it’s appropriate to map out multiple plans. If XXX happens we will plan for YYY. If XXX doesn’t happen, we will plan for ZZZ. 

The next step in your Operating Plan is to develop the budget. With clear assumptions in place you can create the money story to support those plans. Whether you’re predicting growth, staying the same or changing products or services, you put your numbers in place in order to carry out the plans. This is an oversimplification of the budget process. If done right, that process involves a great deal of research, comparison, and give-and-take. That’s a topic for a whole separate article. 

Once you have your budget plan mapped out you can write your goals for the year. Done right, your operating goals for the year will keep you on track to meet your budget. And when tied to your Strategic Plan, they will keep you moving towards your mission or purpose. 

In addition to being tied to your Strategic Plan, annual assumptions, and budget, a well constructed Operating Plan will include the following:

  • Goals for the year – Spell out what you want to achieve over the next year. Define how your operations will be different at the end of the year. 
  • Action steps – Break down the goals into the steps it will take to get you there. Be specific and thorough. 
  • Accountabilities – Assign each step to one person who will be responsible for carrying it out. 
  • Due dates/Checkpoints – Set a due date for each of the action steps. A good practice is to set aside time at the end of each quarter to examine your goals, action steps and accountabilities. By checking in every 90-days you stay on-track and are able to refocus. 

As you develop your Operating Plans, you will want to run it by your stakeholders. This serves as a “reality check”. While you don’t want to turn this into a pseudo Strategic Planning process, you also don’t want to do your planning in a vacuum. Check the logic of your assumptions, goals and action plans. Not only will this ensure that your plans are solid, it will also garner confidence from your stakeholders, and make it easier to get budget approval. 

I really love the quote by Yogi Berra: “You’ve got to be very careful if you don’t know where you’re going, because you might not get there.” Whether you’re ready for a Strategic Plan, or an Operating Plan makes more sense for you, it’s best to know where you’re going.  

Need help with your Strategic Planning, Operational Planning or figuring out which is best for your business? Email me at kim@athena-coco.com to schedule a free 30-minute discovery call to get started creating the best plans for your business! 

Kim Stewart

Kim is a mom, wife, lover of being active and the outdoors,
and helper of small businesses and nonprofits.
kim@athena-coco.com

All Strategies are Not Created Equal

Last week I wrote about Rethinking Strategy and the concept of Real-Time Strategic Planning, based on a book called The Nonprofit Strategy Revolution by David La Piana. While this book is focused on the nonprofit sector, I believe the concepts have wonderful application for both for-profit and not-for-profit businesses. Another concept in the book that I found really compelling is around the Strategy Pyramid. This article will dig into this concept and how it may be a useful way for you to think about strategy in your business.

Traditionally thinking around strategic planning conjures up memories of massive information gathering, multi-day farming sessions, and binders filled with fancy reports. Real-Time Strategic Planning is much more nimble and relevant to today’s fast paced business environment. It is built on the foundation of a strong vision or mission and gives a business the ability to quickly adapt as new challenges or opportunities arise.

Another common trait of traditional strategic planning is that oftentimes the strategies are not strategies at all. Through the traditional planning process many things come up that would be good for the business to focus on. These could be goals, programs, operational processes, technology, or something else all together. While important, these things are not necessary “strategy level” items. At least not Organizational Strategies.

This brings us to La Piana’s Strategy Pyramid. The Strategy Pyramid is made of three levels of strategies:

  • Operational Strategy (bottom)

  • Programmatic Strategy (middle)

  • Organizational Strategy (top)

In this pyramid, the base is made up of Operational Strategies, Programmatic Strategies are in the middle and Organizational Strategies are the top.

Operational Strategies

All strong organizations are built upon a strong base of administrative processes and management systems. In order to run effective programming and have a positive impact on the community a nonprofit must rest upon the solid base of strong operations. To deliver quality products and grow sales a for profit business must have the same solid foundation. Strong operations ensure the “trains run on time” (quote from my friend Cameron Nicholson).

Operational Strategies are the initiatives designed to improve efficiencies, execution, or responsiveness. These could include any number of things. Some examples include:

  • New software will help you manage your campaign more efficiently

  • A Diversity and Inclusion training to grow your staff team

  • Preventative maintenance plans to protect your assets

  • Initiatives to improve communications with staff or customers

Generally speaking, operational strategies are those things impacting the infrastructure of the business, such as human resources, finance, technology or communications.

Programmatic Strategies 

In the nonprofit world, programs are where the “rubber hits the road.” They are how an organization delivers their mission to the world and provides the impact they intend for their community. In the for profit universe, this layer of strategies is likely the products or services the business sells. In both instances, when a customer or community member thinks of the business, it’s the programs or products that they usually think of first.

Programmatic Strategies are the decisions around what activities/products will be delivered and how they will be delivered. Here are a few of the decisions that could lead to Programmatic Strategies:

  • Delivering programs in-person on on-line

  • Providing carry-out or delivery

  • Narrowly focusing your products or offering a broad range

  • One product/program, a few, or many

Programs (or products/services) sits on top of the operations; they are supported by that solid base.

Organizational Strategies

On the top of the pyramid are the Organizational Strategies. These strategies honor and are developed in order to fulfill the organization’s mission or the company’s vision. They take into account trends happening in the market, challenges coming from competitors, opportunities from partnerships, and their unique deliverables. Organizational Strategies are the big picture actions or activities the business will take to move towards achieving its mission or vision. Organizational Strategies include things like:

  • Expanding to new service areas

  • Establishing an intentional brand or culture

  • Shifting funding sources

  • Expanding to online retail

Even though the Organizational Strategies are on the top of the pyramid, this is actually where we start when formulating strategy for a business.

Start Building at the Top

With almost any construction project you start at the base and build up. This process of strategy formation does just the opposite, It starts with clarifying mission and/or vision and builds down through the layers. The mission/vision is the heart of the business, its purpose for being, and the very core of all decision making. It’s a solid practice to regularly visit the mission/vision to keep everyone focused on why the business exists. Your organizational strategies are the ways in which you will work towards your mission/vision. To quote La Piana: “Organizational Strategy is about who and what the nonprofit is in the larger world. It’s about organizational identity, direction, brand, and market position.” Same goes with for profit companies.

Once Organizational Strategies have been established, it gives clarity to the kinds of programs, products or services that should be delivered and how they will reach the participants and customers. Programmatic Strategies can be developed which support and align with the Organizational Strategies. After these top two layers are in place, Operational Strategies can be created in order to best serve the strategies that rest upon this base layer. By building each layer based on the strategies above it, each segment is connected and creates a coordinated set of actions. Programmatic and Operational Strategies can also be thought of as large or involved goals which will help you work towards your Organizational Strategies.

Examples

To help give some clarity, here are a couple of examples of how strategies may look in a for profit company and a nonprofit agency.

  • For profit clothing retailer:

    • Organizational Strategy: In addition to our thriving catalog and website sales we will add pop-up stores in order to see if physical locations will appeal to our customers.

    • Programmatic (Product) Strategy: This summer we will have pop-up stores at festivals in the three states where our sales are highest. We will provide our top selling summer items in a variety of sizes and limited colors.

    • Operational Strategies: In order to support our summer pop-up stores we will need to research and invest in a mobile pay system and mobile store hardware (racks, displays, tent, and changing booth). A dedicated staff will research and secure venues as well as create a schedule and communication system.

  • Nonprofit environmental agency:

    • Organizational Strategy: Our mission is to create a sustainable planet with future generations in mind. To this end we will focus on improving air quality in the metropolitan community we serve.

    • Programmatic Strategy: Our signature program will be a tree planting initiative which will engage volunteers and school or camp youth groups in planting trees. The program will involve education and follow-up care to ensure long-term impact.

    • Operational Strategies: Funding will be central to supporting the tree planting project. Development will focus on grant writing and corporate sponsorships. Additionally, a dedicated staff will be responsible for identifying locations, recruiting volunteers, securing youth groups and coordinating events.

These examples are greatly simplified, but they clearly illustrate the importance of each strategy building upon the one before it. Thinking of strategies as a coordinated set of actions not only reduces waste, it helps propel you towards your vision/mission.

If you would like to explore Real-Time Strategic Planning for your business or organization, email me at kim@athena-coco.com to schedule a free 30-minute consultation. Calm the Chaos by streamlining your strategy development, and find time to focus on what’s important to YOU.

Rethinking Strategic Planning

Any business or nonprofit with a strategic plan developed prior to February 2020 now likely realizes the limitations that come with a traditional 3 to 5 year plan. I doubt there were many strategies in place to help your business deal with a global pandemic. And yet, that is exactly what hit us and continues to challenge many businesses and organizations.

Thinking strategically about where you want to take your business is a key component in making sure you get there. After all, having a great vision for the future of your business is only half the battle. You also need plans and steps to get you there; as well as, communication with and buy-in from your team. If you are still in the process of crafting your vision you might want to go back and read this and maybe this to work on that piece of your business leadership. Once you are crystal clear on your vision, you need to mobilize every member of your team towards reaching that vision. That’s where strategy comes in.

Strategy is defined as:

A plan of action or policy designed to achieve a major or overall aim.

This is a pretty simple definition for something that is so important to the success of your business. This article is going to share some of my ideas on how best to create strategy for your business, along with some of my key take-aways from a book called “The Nonprofit Strategy Revolution” by David La Piana. While the book is focused on strategic planning for the nonprofit sector, the points I will share are applicable for both for profit and nonprofit businesses.

Traditional Strategic Planning

The first point I want to share is around the timing of strategic planning. Traditionally, every 3 to 5 years organizations spend exorbitant amounts of time and energy on creating a beautiful strategic plan. It would involve input from stakeholders and volunteers, customers and staff. Every word would be crafted to be just right. In larger organizations they would often hire a graphic designer add in images and charts and graphs to make it really beautiful for sharing and showing off. There are several problems with this traditional method of strategic planning.

  1. First and foremost is that society and business move too quickly these days for a plan to be relevant for more than a year or so. Businesses need to be much more responsive to the ever changing world.

  2. Building on the first point, your business is likely also changing quickly. As you continue to work towards your vision you will need to continuously recalibrate to ensure you’re still on target.

  3. When a business commits significant time and resources to a strategic planning process, they are often burnt out on the whole thing and they don’t want to even think about strategy for a while. Big mistake since your strategies should be driving your goals, actions and decision making.

  4. Those shiny impressive documents often end up in a drawer or on a shelf, never to be looked at again, until the calendar says it’s time for another planning process. A plan that is not actively referenced and measured is of little value.

Real-Time Strategic Planning

The concept that is laid out in David La Piana’s book provides a method of creating strategy that is much more responsive and relevant than the traditional process. With the need to adapt quickly to new information and dynamics, any business can benefit from implementing the Real-Time Strategic Planning Cycle. Three key components that really differentiate this process from the traditional include:

  • Strategy Screens

  • Big Questions

  • Ongoing Implementation

Strategy Screens

In a traditional planning process the business usually takes time to clarify their mission and/or vision, who they are as a company, and their organizational identity. That part is similar in the Real-Time process. The next step is what really looks different as the business uses that information to create “Strategy Screens”. These are criteria the organization will use to analyze potential strategies they might implement when faced with challenges and opportunities. The Strategy Screens helps the company determine if the potential strategy is consistent with their organizational identity.

Every company’s Strategy Screens will be unique to their organization and will likely evolve over time and as needs change. Screens are written in the form of a statement that each potential strategy is compared against. For example, La Piana’s suggests that most companies will have something similar to these two screens:

  • The strategy is consistent with our mission/purpose.

  • The strategy builds on our current competitive advantage(s).

Each business will have between 5 and 8 screens. Other topics that are important to compare the potential strategies to are things like breaking-even or surplusing, sustainability, human capacity, consistency with brand, and honoring key relationships. By developing Strategy Screens thoughtfully and intentionally AND before a crisis or opportunity presents itself, will simplify your decision making. This process helps you focus on what is important as an organization and avoid being reactionary or losing sight of who you are when the pressure is on.

Big Questions

When a challenge or opportunity presents itself, rather than jump to the potential strategies, the Real-Time process involves determining the “Big Question”. The Big Question frames the challenge/opportunity and can drive the potential strategies. For example, when the pandemic hit, restaurants struggled significantly. Options for the Big Questions for businesses that particular industry may have been things like:

  • How will we stay in business?

  • How can we change our business to meet new needs?

  • How will the restaurant industry survive?

  • What can we do to support our community in new ways?

This is a short-list, I’m sure there are many more that came up. Notice that the questions will drive different strategies. It’s good to ask the question in several different ways to determine what will be best for your business. In the end you may decide that you need to combine several of the questions in order to develop the right potential strategies.

After determining your Big Question for a given issue and coming up with all the potential strategies, you go back and measure them against your Strategy Screens. Make a simple graph with the different strategies along the top and the screens along the left side. Test each strategy against each screen to see how they measure up. This tool should make it easy to see which strategies measure up best with the screens you have committed to.

Ongoing Implementation

In order to make strategic planning valuable, it needs to produce results, right? Strategies in and of themselves do not lead to action. Once you use the Strategy Screens and Big Questions to determine the strategy or strategies you will implement moving forward, you need to develop goals, action steps and accountability. In the restaurant example, if you decide your strategy is going to involve shifting your servers to meal deliverers, that alone will not get you there. You need to break it down.

I think this is where the Real-Time process really shines and produces results you just don’t see from the traditional process. By looking so far down the road, even when the traditional system sets clear goals, actions and accountability, they are usually so far reaching that the company loses sight of them and they become irrelevant before they are completed. Real-Time strategies are addressing immediate challenges or opportunities; therefore, the goals and actions that are developed in this process are crucial to moving the organization forward. Simple tracking tools that are reviewed weekly will keep everyone on track and accountable.

This is a very simplified explanation of what I believe to be key differentiators between these two strategic planning processes. It’s not meant to cover everything, rather to help you understand the value of looking at strategy creation in a new and innovative way. I utilize many of these concepts when working with businesses to help them become thoughtfully responsive, while forging ahead.

If you would like to explore Real-Time Strategic Planning for your business or organization, email me at kim@athena-coco.com to schedule a free 30-minute consultation. Calm the Chaos by streamlining your strategy development, and find time to focus on what’s important to YOU.