Implementing corporate strategic planning can help you transform your business and achieve your long-term corporate objectives. We talk a lot about strategy here at TBG – with good reason. Without a clear and well-structured strategy, your business cannot thrive. Corporate strategic planning is one of the areas many businesses struggle with – but it also holds the key to meaningful and sustainable future growth.
To help you get started, we’ve put together this blog post on the corporate strategic planning process. Learn how to use this to your advantage below.
Defining corporate strategic planning
Put simply, corporate strategic planning adopts a company-wide approach to achieve a long-term business goal or vision. This process can be naturally complex, especially for larger companies, as it encompasses various aspects of your company identity, departments and regional divisions.
The corporate strategic planning process is a crucial component when it comes to the sustained success of your business. As such, it should be prioritised before annual budgeting and general planning for the year ahead.
The benefits of corporate strategic planning
There are numerous benefits to be found within the corporate strategic planning process, besides achieving an ultimate goal. Some of our favourites include:
- Gives both leaders and employees ideas and inspiration for positive change
- Creates structure that allows for growth through adaptability and playing on your strengths
- Protects your business from costly or irrelevant detours
- Creates competitive advantage
What are the steps in the corporate strategic planning process?
It’s best to approach the corporate strategic planning process in a structured manner, ideally with expert support if you don’t have that in-house already. These are the three main steps – but in between these there are many other stages to the process to be considered.
1. Conduct a competitive analysis
First, understand the market you’re in and assess the lay of the land. What political, legal, social and environmental factors impact your future journey? Are there trends to consider? Other factors specifically relevant to your business and industry will also need to be considered at this stage. Some common tools used for this include SWOT analysis, Porter’s 5 Forces and the Strategic Group Analysis.
2. Identifying strategic goals and priorities
Once you’ve established your position and have an idea of the landscape you’ll be working within, you’ll then need to set overarching strategic business goals and prioritise. These then need to be distributed between different areas and departments of the business – which is where OKRs come in. You’ll need to consider not only what you want to do but how you’ll accomplish each goal – including budgets and human resources.
3. Communication
Once you have finalised and completed the principle steps in the corporate strategic planning process, you will then need to consider how to effectively communicate the plans to ensure they are implemented properly. This stage is just as important as its preceding steps, as without priorities and plans being integrated fully throughout the company, the overall plan cannot come to fruition.
How can we help?
Approaching the corporate strategic planning process alone can feel daunting – but it needn’t be. If you need professional corporate strategic planning support for your business, we’re here to help. Talk to a Giant today.