Making Strategic Planning a Habit

What is strategic planning and how can it help in your daily life?

We often hear of strategic planning for businesses, but why not adopt strategic planning in your life? This method of planning is often defined as setting out goals and objectives to improve the course of a plan or business. It involves envisioning where you want to be while identifying the process you want to take to get to where you need and want to be.

Determining Your Direction

When setting a strategic plan, the first thing you need to do is determine your position. Where do you stand right now and where are you going? This involves identifying the issues you have, determining opportunities and threats, and strengths and weaknesses. This process is much like performing a SWOT on a business. Much like determining your SWOT on your business, you can approach your life like a business, where setting goals is concerned.

After first considering where you stand, think about your weaknesses and threats, think about how you plan to deal with them. Having a Plan B when considering your threats and weaknesses can help you to determine an outlook where you can see past what is happening in front of you. Now, just because there are weaknesses or threats, that doesn’t mean that you will have a hard time ahead, it is good to be aware of them if an obstacle does occur in your plan, then you can evaluate Plan B and action it. Weaknesses can also be a learning experience, by taking the weaknesses you have and learning how to turn them into strengths, can also help you to learn new skills.

Next, we have your strengths and opportunities. Focusing on your strengths and opportunities can help you to identify where future opportunities you can take on to help you gauge where you want to go in your plan. For example, if you are good at working with numbers and you have an interest in this area, but you are not sure what you want to do with your career, perhaps considering a career in accounting could be a direction to explore. Focusing on your strengths and opportunities can also help to build confidence while shedding light on how your skills interconnect and can work together to strategically plan for your next stage of life.

Making the Strategy

After you have taken the time to determine your SWOT analysis on yourself, you need to determine your strategy. To begin thinking about writing a personal manifesto or mission. For tips on how to construct a manifesto or mission check out my blog on creating a manifesto. Writing a mission statement is determining your core purpose. For example, you might want to determine that you want to work with people to improve their lives financially. So, carrying on the accounting example above, you could make a mission statement that says, “Professionally work with others to make the best financial decisions, to help clients achieve maximum financial benefits, that lead to a prosperous life.”

Going along with making a strategy, you will need to determine your values. Values are what is at the core of our inner being, and many people struggle to identify what their core values are. Just like a company, each person has a set of values that they live by, whether they know it or not. Values can encompass all aspects of your self-being and can include everything from living modestly to integrity and respect.  

This stage also includes your competitive advantages. Determining your competitive advantages can help you not only to know where you stand but can also help to answer some challenging interview questions that you may encounter when looking for a job. If you know that you have a degree in mathematics, and you want to work in accounting with a large multinational firm, then, knowing why your degree is beneficial to the individual you are speaking with will help you to create a more responsive answer.

Next set your long-term objectives. Choose them based on what you would like to do with your career, business, personal life goals, or anything you want to work on. Choose a time range such as one to five years, and set out when you would like to achieve your goals. To learn more about setting up strategic goals check out my goal setting blog.

Finally, don’t forget to forecast. Think about roadblocks that could be ahead, that could set you back and how you can rebound from them and learn about yourself in the process. Forecasting involves working to determine anything that could hinder your progress, while, as discussed above, having a Plan B, can help you come through any hindrances and setbacks.

Finally, set yourself up to roll out your plan. Once you have your gears in place you will be able to start making the right steps in your plan and will have an additional plan in place in case other opportunities arise. The main thing to remember is to have fun in the planning and execution process while working to achieve your goals.