The Perils of Not Planning

“We have devised a unique sort of bureaucratic machine which tends… to ensure that our operation… will always be vigorous, will never grow tired, but will also never grow wiser.” (Komer, 1972)

In the absence of a strategic plan and effective implementation of the plan, consider the consequences that could negatively affect your organization:

1. Lack of institutional memory. If there is no coherent strategy, goals, and objectives working toward the mission and vision of the organization, change can happen in a patch-work, ad hoc, top-down and/or circumscribed process. When turnover occurs, leaders may naively shift priorities and agendas leading to a culture of constant reinvention and potential drift from the mission and vision of the organization.

When strategic planning structures, processes, and an institutional memory exists, future leaders can rely on this contingency during their turn at long-range planning. When the vision and plan are widely disseminated within the organization, and to major stakeholders, history can inform the present, and the process of visioning and long-range planning can be self-sustaining even after the resignation of key leadership.

2. Lack of organizational definition. Often, confusion exists about the varied roles and responsibilities of leadership, members, and staff, as well as their relationships to one another and to members. From a governance perspective, ambiguity, in certain instances, can lead to role confusion, role conflict, and the over-extension of roles. Confusion on the roles of governance and administration can seriously derail planning and foster instability by allowing misalignment and misperception to upset priorities, budget, and communication, at the very least.

Good strategy, along with good governance, provides a framework and a process for the allocation of decision-making authorities in three areas: fiduciary (legal responsibilities of oversight and stewardship), strategic (major decision about resources, programs and services) and generative (deep inquiry, exploring root causes and values). Active and healthy governance will take action to bring initiatives under control when they stray from anticipated deadlines or intended results especially when roles are clearly defined, and individuals are well aware of their responsibilities. For example, it is commonly the Secretary who is entrusted with the duty to guard the organization’s institutional memory by assuring official communications are documented.

3. Budget-driven decisions rather than needs driven. Organizations often find it challenging to link planning to budgeting because planning is conducted at the strategic level while budgeting is typically conducted at the operational level. Without connections, and alignment, between strategy and operations, organizations can fall into such activities as reactive spending, or chasing grant dollars, which can lead to drift away from the mission and vision.

When strategy alignment is present and governance provides the framework to allow for good decision making, these problems can be alleviated. Planning converts values to action, promotes fact-based decisions, and allows limited resources to be committed in an orderly way. When decision need to be made, the plan can be consulted to determine which decision will help advance the plan best. Decisions made under the guidance of planning can work in a coherent way to advance the organization’s goals.

4. Crisis-driven management. Without a strategic plan, anticipating, preventing, or coping with difficulties and emergencies, can be overwhelming. Organizations can find themselves reeling from crisis to crisis if their boards are motivated by short term thinking that fosters reactive instead of proactive decision making.

When a plan is in place, organizations can plan for change in increasingly complex environments. Rather than organization being steered by external forces, conscious and focused choices can be made to take control of situations and circumstances. Predicaments do happen, and things can become derailed, however, once crises are under control, a board that can quickly reclaim its field of vision, and the long term strategies needed to achieve the vision, will have more chances of success.

5. Shifting priorities. Lack of focus, lack of synergy, chasing competing opportunities, misallocation of resources, fragmenting of the organization, and changing leadership are some of the consequences that can befall an organization without a plan that is aligned with vision, mission and purpose.

Strategic planning helps organizations determine the best direction for its future. Creating a plan requires disciplined effort to explore alternatives, address future implications of present decisions, and provides way of measuring success. Strategic priorities guide operational and budgeting decisions.

“If you don’t know where you’re going, any road will take you there.” Proverb

6. Membership dissatisfaction and erosion of support. Membership and stakeholders may, or may not, have expressed opinions and attitudes about their performance expectations of the organization, but you can be sure that uncertainty, confusion, and lack of accountability around the vision and future of the organization will weaken stable and positive perceptions as expectations fall short, satisfaction declines, and supporters turn away.

Strategic planning promotes communication and brings people together with a common goal; to plan for, and support, an organization’s future.

Conclusion
Strategic planning is a tool that provides organizations with structures and practices that are likely to enhance their ability to analyze conditions, express a vision, formulate goals, and persuade others to promote and support the advancement of its mission. Planning makes the process of change easier by aligning effort, improving communications, ensuring better decisions are made, to promote the effective use of resources.

Sources:
Board Development Program, Alberta Culture and Community Spirit, Workshop Handout #3, Governance as Leadership, Copyright 2011, adapted with permission from Governance as leadership: reframing the work of nonprofit boards by Richard P. Chait, William R. Ryan and Barbara E. Taylor, Hoboken NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc. 2005.

Broder, P., McClintock, N., & Amundson, W. (2002). Primer for directors of not-for-profit corporations . Ottawa, Ont.: Industry Canada.
Cox, J. B. (2007). Strategic Management. Professional practices in association management: the essential resource for effective management of nonprofit organizations (2nd ed., p. 29). Washington, DC: ASAE & the Center for Association Leadership.

Strategic Planning Toolkit. (2003). An office for Victims Crime (OVC TTAC).

R.W. Komer, Bureaucracy Does Its Thing (Santa Monica, CA: RAND, 1972), 67.

Executive Director Guide. (n.d.). Big Brothers Big Sisters of Canada.