The right time?

Do you need a better strategy? Strategic planning takes considerable time and effort, so it's only worthwhile if you're sure your organisation will benefit from it. Before you launch into planning, ask yourself whether your organisation actually needs a better strategy.

Consider these pointers:

Do people within your team have significantly different views about why your organisation exists?
Is there a feeling that the world is changing faster than you can cope with?
Do you have trouble explaining to other people what you do?
Do you feel like you are struggling compared with other organisations in your field?
Are people/teams/departments pulling in different directions?
Are your services really delivering the results you want?

Is now the right time to develop a strategic plan?

There is no ideal moment to kick off the planning process, but generally, you should look at renewing your strategy every three to five years. Remember that, even if your strategy seems to be working now, if you don't keep an eye on changes outside your organisation, you run the risk of becoming irrelevant, missing out on opportunities or having major threats take you by surprise.

Don't get put off too easily. You will very rarely feel like you have all the time, or all the skills, required. But you don't need an MBA to develop a good plan and if you prioritise the strategic plan, and timetable it cleverly, you can get it done quicker than you might think.

Make the most of change

Some organisations find the disruption brought about by a major change, a useful prompt to focus on strategy and revisit the organisation's direction and purpose. Motivating factors often include:

the arrival of new senior staff
the emergence of a new project
or a funding opportunity.

Find out more about managing change.

When to say no

There are, however, definite moments when organisations shouldn't look to a strategic planning process to help them, for example, if:

your organisation is in the midst of a crisis, you're not likely to be able to give yourself the time and space to focus on your strategy.
a recent strategic planning process fell apart, it won't help to begin a new one if you don't investigate why and how the previous attempt failed.