Herding the cats
Does a cat know it's a cat? If it knows it's cat - or doesn't know it's a cat - how does that influence its behavior?
As a cat owner, I can tell you cats are highly assertive and very effective at getting their way. Sam the cat has me well trained to meet his needs. I am not sure what he thinks he is, but he has a strong self identity from which flows the set of actions he takes every day: sleep, eat, play, roam, watch birds, seek affection, bite, and so on.
We humans, of course, have even more self awareness, and how we act and what we do are driven by who we are, what we know and what we want. In our case, being more highly self-aware, we have the ability to plan and to envision success and pursue results over time. My cat's planning is tactical and his planning horizon is the time it takes him to sneak up on the rabbit in the garden. Our planning can be strategic and our time horizon can span years, our expected lifetime and or even future generations.
Further, we have a rich context to draw from when we plan ahead. To inform our planning we have experience, know facts, can tap others' experience and insights, and can learn about trends, opportunities and threats. This rich context is magnified when the planning moves from a solo practice to a group process, where a wider body of self-aware people construct a compelling vision of future success for the organization and develop strategies that will move the organization toward the vision, to a better place.
When I facilitate group planning efforts I use Participative Process Consulting techniques I learned through the Institute of Management Consultants. These techniques are based on the understanding that the consultant's role is to bring and facilitate a process in which the participants, armed with data and other resources, define the problem and find the solution. The consultant, unless he or she is truly a subject matter expert, does not supply answers. At the most, he or she generates vital information ahead of the process (organizational or stakeholder survey and environmental scan), supplies insights and facts, and offers checks on "group think," ignored information, faulty reasoning and hidden biases.
I see few references to the application this form of participative decision-making or consensus decision-making in strategic planning. Typically the process is merely referred to as "the planning group plans." Sometimes the value of outside facilitation is recognized, but often it is not.
My cat may have a simple life, limited options and enough self awareness to seamlessly decide what to do at a given time. Having been involved in and facilitated many planning processes over my career, I can tell you it's not that simple to get a group of board members and/or executives aligned on a stretch vision and effective strategies. Aligned they must get for strategic planning to work, but the process can be akin to herding cats.
So what's the message here? Three points:
An effective strategic plan is not something imposed on the organization by a consultant, a facilitator or any individual in the organization - Board chair, CEO or any other single leader.
Effective planning harnesses the knowledge and insights of the organizational leadership team, augmented by whatever relevant information and external insights that can be tapped. The team finds the shared vision and the strategies to move to the organization to the vision.
Cats don't do a great job of herding themselves and getting anywhere together. Best to engage an unbiased outside facilitator to be the herder and to supply the process that moves the group to the point of strategy implementation.
