Dwight D Eisenhower

This might seem like a strange quote for a planning site, but it makes an important point. Often the planning process is more valuable than the plan.

Whatever plan you have, as soon as you start to take action – whether it’s a business launch, a new market entry, restructuring (or a battle) – things happen – events.

We’ve all encountered the situation where a carefully prepared business, marketing or communications plan runs into unexpected obstacles as soon as it’s applied. Competitors may react unpredictably, economic situations change, costs fluctuate. Good managers don’t allow themselves to be slaves to the plan but react intelligently, adapting to changing situations while keeping their eyes on the objective.

Another great strategist, Von Clauswitz, observed that in ‘the fog of war’ there is no strategy, it all depends upon the intuition of the great generals. However, intuition is valueless unless it is grounded on a sound planning process.

Remember the objective.

If a plan appears to diminish in value in the face of events, it is absolutely essential to have a clear objective. If the objective is sound  and the planning process has considered options and directions, tactical actions and movements can safely be left to experience and intuition. In fact, it is a much stronger approach than sticking rigidly to plans.

Flexibility permits creative and innovative tactical actions.

The steps should be:

1. Set your objective. This should be ‘big picture’. Be clear on what you want to achieve, often SMART objective setting can be a useful discipline. Sometimes you will need ‘fuzzy goals’, particularly if you are seeking to generate new ideas. However, an identified objective is still required to give direction.
2. Go through the planning process, individually or collaboratively. This is where options can be explored, responses prepared, resources calculated and identified, and potential pitfalls considered.
3. Do it.

Here is a guide to help you gather your thoughts and filter your thinking down into a strategy to help put your export communications plan into action.

• What market environment facts do you need to consider?
• What market facts and data do you need to collate?
• What is the media arena in your chosen market?
• Who is your audience (or audiences)?
• What do you want to say to them?
• What action do you want them to take in response?

Download the guide in interactive PDF format.

All men can see these tactics whereby I conquer, but what none can see is the strategy out of which victory is evolved.
Sun Tzu

A strategy document should not be a huge tome, in fact it can often be summarised in a single page. However, the tactics employed to achieve that objective may be detailed, complex and extensive. For example, a marketing strategy may be to identify a market gap and secure a (say) 20% share, with a new product in (say) two years. The tactics however, may include research, product development, distribution, partnerships, testing, packaging, advertising, establishing channels, sales promotion etc. Strategies tend to be long term and unchanging except in response to seismic events. Tactics, in contrast, may be constantly evolving and changing in response to market, competitive, environmental forces and practical considerations.

Finally, strategy must have continuity. It can’t be constantly reinvented.
Michael Porter

Understanding the differing roles of strategy and tactics, and their importance is vital. Consider the matrix below:

Obviously, if you have both strong strategy and tactics (the ‘A’ box) your business is likely to thrive. If your strategy is strong but your tactics are weak, you are likely to survive – you are doing the right things, but just not doing them very well (the ‘C’ box). However, if your strategy is weak but your tactics are strong (‘B’), you will probably die quickly – you are doing all the wrong things, but executing them too effectively! If both your strategy and tactics are weak, you are likely to die slowly – you are doing the wrong thing and it may take a while to find out (‘D’).

However beautiful the strategy, you should occasionally look at the results.
Winston Churchill

The key is flexibility: but then you may well ask, “How do we plan for flexibility?” The answer is to concentrate on strategic issues, but leave your tactics flexible. Lets look at an analogy:

Suppose you are going for a walk, from A to B: you know where you are starting from (A) and you know where your objective is (B). But you don’t walk in a straight line (the red line). You are likely to come across obstacles. First there is a hill, then a lake. So, you have to change course, and your likely path may be more like the green line. By point (1) you are way off course to the South, and by point (2) you are way off to the North. But, so long as you are clear where your big objective (B)  is you keep amending your course and get there.

Knowing your objective is your strategic plan; changes in the route to negotiate obstacles are tactical decisions. When you plan in uncertain conditions it is important to be clear about your big-picture objectives, but allow your tactical milestones to be flexible and move to accommodate change.

The review process is critically important in uncertain times – but it is critical to take an overall view. Most of the items in our plan will be interrelated: something that impacts one area negatively may open up opportunities in another. It is all too easy to become obsessed with one item and be unable to see the big picture. Your review meetings should be about overall assessment. Having separate financial, sales, production or management reviews may be necessary for larger organizations, but plenary reviews to see how everything is interacting is vital. The same is true of gantt charts and PERTs – used properly they are great aids, but too often they become just parts of a corporate dogma – the province of the priests that brought them down from the mountains and obstacles to flexibility

The tools you use for your planning should be carefully considered to allow for this flexibility. Spreadsheets can be great – if used properly. By that I mean using them them to show how things are interrelated so that you can change one bit of data and see how it impacts upon others – they can allow you to play complicated ‘what-if’ games with ease. When used wrongly they are a dangerous hindrance. Often I have seen spreadsheets that are beautiful, the result of  weeks or months of burnt midnight oil, but they have not used a spreadsheet’s strength and interconnected the data. As a result, any changes mean somebody going away and recalculating whole areas of the sheet – with a result that these actions are not taken, and the spreadsheet becomes a barrier to change rather than an aid.

For strategic planning, my preference is to use anything that allows flexibility and an easy view of the big picture – whiteboards, corkboards, post-it notes, index or planning cards. These allow constant review and easy response to change while keeping sight of those big objectives.