In Defense of Strategic Planning: A Rebuttal. Mike Allison is one of the leaders who defined strategic planning for the nonprofit sector, and he continues to expand and develop his thinking and practice in the area. We're delighted to have his rebuttal to the article in the last issue of Blue Avocado, Strategic Planning: Failures & Alternatives: I am an unapologetic advocate of traditional strategic planning. I have to admit I am not a disinterested party in this debate. As a consultant with nonprofits for the last twenty years, much of my work has been done under the umbrella of strategic planning. Strategic planning is made irrelevant by major shifts in the environment.
Strategic planning is pushed by expensive consultants. "Expensive" is a relative term. Strategic planning takes a long time. Strategic planning is too often driven by funders. Document can be produced in a matter of days.) Furthermore, most foundations, including the one funded by two of the richest people in the world (Gates Foundation) take their own medicine. Alternatives to Strategic Planning. In Part 1 of this two-article series, we discussed some of the ways in which strategic planning processes have served nonprofits poorly. One key reason is that strategic planning is the primary organizational change process that nonprofits know about, that boards are comfortable with, and that funders will fund.
In this article we give some alternatives, in part because it's helpful just to have choices when facing organizational decisions. Strategic planning -- when done appropriately for your organization -- can be exactly the right tool for the job. But, too often, strategic planning is undertaken for reasons that would be better served by other methods: engaging the board, getting everyone on the same page, getting buy-in from stakeholders, and so forth. Different processes are better for different types of decisions and challenges. Focus on the questions that need answers And at least at the beginning, make yourselves frame them as yes/no questions. Strategic Learning Agenda. Strategic Planning: Failures and Alternatives. Here is Part 1 of a two-article series on strategic planning and alternatives to strategic planning. Strategic planning swept into the nonprofit sector in the mid 1980s. Nonprofits were becoming seriously interested in management techniques, and strategic planning -- along with meeting facilitation and fundraising training -- was a focal point for that interest.
Twenty years later, today no organization would dare say it doesn't have a strategic plan. As the recession deepens, many nonprofits now have strategic plans that they can't move forward on. Those plans aren't helping them figure out what to do instead. And even before the economic crisis, there has been widespread grumbling about strategic planning. Organizations often undertake strategic planning "to get board members engaged" or "to get everyone on the same page," objectives which could be reached in much more efficient, productive ways. Mismanagement, conflicts between the board and the executive, racial tension, etc. Northwest Areas Foundation Takes Stock of 0m Mistake. February 16, 2011; Source: Star Tribune | Ten years ago, the Northwest Area Foundation took a bold, well-motivated step toward doing what many people have long wanted to see from private foundations – dedicating a huge amount of money to anti-poverty efforts. Two hundred million dollars later, the foundation has concluded that the program was a failure due to a number of problems.
According to a report on the experience, the foundation "failed to recognize the flaws in its theory," lacked clear goals, and suffered from a "learn-as-you-go" approach to philanthropy. The theory was to devote 10 years' worth of grantmaking to anti-poverty efforts, investing $150 million in 10 communities (including Indian tribes) in 8 states plus another $50 million in leadership development and smaller grants for anti-poverty programs.
But the key feature was the 10-community long term investment effort. What really happened? JL: Making of the Roadmap. A behind-the-scenes look at The Junior League’s 21st century transformation In the spring of 2009, Susan Danish, Executive Director of The Association of Junior Leagues International, Inc. made a call to Heather McLeod Grant of The Monitor Institute, a renowned think tank consultancy for the nonprofit sector. Danish and the AJLI Board and Staff, over the course of several years of research and analysis, had discovered a troubling trend. Junior League membership, since peaking at just under 200,000 in the late 1990s, had been in gradual decline for more than a decade. Truth in numbers “While we knew the declines were not happening every year in every League—and that the numbers were not the only measurement of a successful organization—we also knew the membership numbers were symptomatic of something more,” said Danish.
AJLI had conducted broad scale market research among current, resigned and prospective members to better understand what the numbers might mean. The results were telling. The Importance of a Good Success Story. From Guest Blogger Christina Delzingaro. Christina has over 20 years of success as an entrepreneurial non-profit executive. A graduate of Randolph-Macon Woman’s College and of Averett University, Christina has her undergraduate degree in developmental economics and a Masters of Business Administration. After many years as Executive Director for a regional non-profit, Christina created Sage Strategies, a management consulting firm (www.SageStrategies.org).
The firm specializes in strategic planning, board development, financial management, program planning and evaluation and grants management. An old non-profit. The first step was to hire an Executive Director with the ability to make the programming changes necessary to address the needs of children and families -- the changes funders and long-frustrated community partners had been asking for. In order to become relevant, the organization had to change its context: its reason for being, its image, its story.
The old outcome measures: Natural Capital: A New Force in Strategic Planning (August 5, 2010) | Opinion Blog. The concept of natural capital is catching on with strategic planners, enhancing both corporate sustainability and bottom lines. BP’s Deepwater Horizon oil well crisis in the Gulf of Mexico is a caution to other companies to take stock of the entirety of their natural capital—not just the natural resource reserve they draw on, but the ecosystems in which they operate. The idea that natural capital should be viewed as a balance sheet asset, to be as carefully stewarded as other forms of capital, surfaced in the late 1990s.
But with the publication of the Millennium Ecosystems Assessment by 1,360 international scientists in 2005, more firms are moving from theory to practice and taking stock of natural capital in the course of ongoing strategic planning. In its best form, incorporating natural capital into business decision-making not only mitigates risk of noncompliance but also creates solutions for supply chains and markets. Wilderness Time for Nonprofits. I want to thank the conference planners for inviting me here today, and for allowing me to be on the program before the speakers who are going to talk to you about uplifting topics like the state of the economy and how to avoid insolvency. After that, I suspect most of you will be too busy calling your therapists to have much time or patience for the likes of me. I think it’s important for us in our reflections this morning, not to pass too quickly through this grim and trying time in our eagerness to put it behind us, and to talk instead about the all-new and improved nonprofit sector somewhere just over the horizon.
That wouldn’t be honest, and it wouldn’t be helpful to you. I know that many of you are frazzled to the utmost trying to deal with incredibly difficult and pressing problems—too few dollars to support too few staff to deal with far too many and ever increasing social problems. Indeed, it must often feel to some of you like you’ve wandered into a howling, desolate wilderness. Social Innovation Conversations | Stanford Social Innovation Review Quickcasts | David La Piana.