Planning – Starting With the End In Mind
At the beginning of our strategic planning process we create a company vision. The second step is to create goals that directly fall out of that vision. The third step is to set those goals to a timeline. These three items make up the organization’s strategic plan.
When setting goal to a timeline the most common way of creating the timeline is to first create the goal and the time frame in which the goal should ideally be reached. Then the planning group creates a timeline of all the people and resources they need to achieve the goal by the time limit. When they are thinking about creating the goal, the planning group are mostly concerned with the HOW of creating the goal. In doing this they start from the point of nothing and create the first step, then the second step, and so on until they think they will achieve the completed project.
The problem with this type of planning is that the planning process requires quite a bit of time to plan in this way. It also requires that all the people involved in the planning process to already have the expertise of creating the goal which many times is not the case. Because not everyone will have the skills at the time of the planning there is a strong possibility that there will be time overruns during the implementation process. Errors made in the actual plan will start to show up when adjusting the plan from perceived step to the actual steps needed to achieve the goal.
There is another way to plan and it takes only a fraction of the time; it is called planning with the end in mind. Planning in this way is a RESULTS focus plan rather than HOW focused plan. The way it works is this: Choose a goal and the date of achievement. Then for that date write down all RESULTS that you will have that will show you have achieved that goal. What would you HAVE as a result of achieving that goal?
The next step seems counter intuitive. Many people that I’ve done this exercise with have a great deal of problems shifting their mental models. For this type of planning you will need to trust the process. The second step is to choose the date half way between the achievement date and today’s date (If your final achievement date is in 20 years half would be 10 years from today.) and write down the RESULTS that you will have achieved by the halfway point of the RESULTS you wrote down from the final results list. What would you HAVE at the halfway point a result of achieving your final goal? Do not think about what you would have to do from today’s date to get to that halfway point.
The next step is to choose the date half way between the halfway point (or the quarter-point) and today’s date (If your halfway point is in 10 years the quarter-point would be 5 years from today.) and write down the RESULTS that you will have achieved by the quarter point of the RESULTS you wrote down from the halfway point results list. What would you HAVE at the quarter point as result of achieving your halfway goal? Do not think about what you would have to do from today’s date to get to that quarter-point.
Repeat this process until you come to know what RESULTS you will need to achieve tomorrow. Once you come to this point you will find that the method of how to achieve each step will fall out easily out of the RESULTS map you have created. This method allows you to not have the expertise but gives you the time frame in which you need to have the expertise to create the result. It allows a goal, no matter how large to appear completely achievable. I have had individuals create world peace, fix environmental problems, bring democracy to China, etc, and know how it was completely achievable by using this planning method.
Please try it and tell me how it works for you.
Tracy Slotin, MBA
CEO
The Executive Sandbox® Change Consultants
www.ExecutiveSandbox.com
When setting goal to a timeline the most common way of creating the timeline is to first create the goal and the time frame in which the goal should ideally be reached. Then the planning group creates a timeline of all the people and resources they need to achieve the goal by the time limit. When they are thinking about creating the goal, the planning group are mostly concerned with the HOW of creating the goal. In doing this they start from the point of nothing and create the first step, then the second step, and so on until they think they will achieve the completed project.
The problem with this type of planning is that the planning process requires quite a bit of time to plan in this way. It also requires that all the people involved in the planning process to already have the expertise of creating the goal which many times is not the case. Because not everyone will have the skills at the time of the planning there is a strong possibility that there will be time overruns during the implementation process. Errors made in the actual plan will start to show up when adjusting the plan from perceived step to the actual steps needed to achieve the goal.
There is another way to plan and it takes only a fraction of the time; it is called planning with the end in mind. Planning in this way is a RESULTS focus plan rather than HOW focused plan. The way it works is this: Choose a goal and the date of achievement. Then for that date write down all RESULTS that you will have that will show you have achieved that goal. What would you HAVE as a result of achieving that goal?
The next step seems counter intuitive. Many people that I’ve done this exercise with have a great deal of problems shifting their mental models. For this type of planning you will need to trust the process. The second step is to choose the date half way between the achievement date and today’s date (If your final achievement date is in 20 years half would be 10 years from today.) and write down the RESULTS that you will have achieved by the halfway point of the RESULTS you wrote down from the final results list. What would you HAVE at the halfway point a result of achieving your final goal? Do not think about what you would have to do from today’s date to get to that halfway point.
The next step is to choose the date half way between the halfway point (or the quarter-point) and today’s date (If your halfway point is in 10 years the quarter-point would be 5 years from today.) and write down the RESULTS that you will have achieved by the quarter point of the RESULTS you wrote down from the halfway point results list. What would you HAVE at the quarter point as result of achieving your halfway goal? Do not think about what you would have to do from today’s date to get to that quarter-point.
Repeat this process until you come to know what RESULTS you will need to achieve tomorrow. Once you come to this point you will find that the method of how to achieve each step will fall out easily out of the RESULTS map you have created. This method allows you to not have the expertise but gives you the time frame in which you need to have the expertise to create the result. It allows a goal, no matter how large to appear completely achievable. I have had individuals create world peace, fix environmental problems, bring democracy to China, etc, and know how it was completely achievable by using this planning method.
Please try it and tell me how it works for you.
Tracy Slotin, MBA
CEO
The Executive Sandbox® Change Consultants
www.ExecutiveSandbox.com
Labels: Planning
posted by Tracy Slotin at 1:36 AM
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