Any business consultant, regardless of their money, should know how to conduct an event to define the strategy. This plan will inform all major decisions regarding the areas to concentrate and invest money on and how to manage internal resources.
1. Opportunities, Threats, and Risks
To begin, you should focus on the external influences that impact the company or the business you work with. That is what are the possibilities, threats, and risks for the company. One example could be the change in the mortgage lending market that presents an opportunity for your company as an agent for property development. It could also be the arrival of a major builder into your region that directly affects your business. It is best to conduct an exercise of brainstorming in order to create as much involvement and participation as is possible.
Following this, you can prioritize every issue by using a two-by-2 matrix that includes “What is the likelihood of it happening” along the vertical line (low to high) and “How relevant is it?” (low to very high) for the horizontal axis.
When the most relevant issues that have a significant probability of occurring (that is, the upper right-hand part of the matrix) are identified in the meeting, you can discuss each one in terms of
What exactly is it?
What is the significance of it?
What is the significance of this?
What’s the likelihood of this happening?
2. Strengths, weaknesses, and gaps
The next step is to look at the internal factors that affect the business. Consider the most important internal factors that are affecting the company or some aspect that is affecting the company. One internal strength could be the technical expertise of your employees or already established sales procedures.
Then, prioritize each factor by using a 2x 2 matrix that includes the “How robust or fragile” (low to very high) along the vertical axis as well as “How crucial is this?” (low to very high) for the horizontal axis.
When the essential,’ strong factors have been identified, examine each in the context of:
What exactly is it?
What is the significance of this?
What’s its likely impact?
The initial two steps are similar to the steps of a SWOT analysis, except that each aspect is ranked and the most important factors are discussed. This allows the group to discuss their concerns and future expectations. This is something that’s often lost if you simply think about the future.
3. Critical Success Factors
Following the prioritization of SWOT, pay attention to the key success factors, which is, what do we need to as a business does in the next 2 to three years to achieve success. In order to ensure that the goal remains strategic, it is crucial to think about external opportunities and threats (that is the first step) when contemplating the CSFs.
After brainstorming, talk about each CSF and the reasons why people view it as crucial, and the implications for the operation of each. Following the discussion, you can do prioritization exercises, such as the nominal group techniques (NGT). NGT generally involves giving 3 votes to each individual, and they are free to allocate these votes however they like. They can distribute 3 votes to one factor or allocate one vote to each of the three factors.
4. Values
An essential element of a workshop on strategy must include a discussion of how people will collaborate rather than just what they’ll be working on. When the CSF’s are aligned to external influences, The Values will be aligned to internal elements (no. 2). These values unite top teams in stressful or stressful moments.
To think about this, consider the following questions “in your own opinion, what do we need to value (believe in) in order in order to succeed?”
Talk about each of the values:
What is this referring to?
What is the significance of it?
What is it that you would like to see? What does it look like? How would your role in this be to other people?
Prioritize and agree on the most important of the half dozen or so by using a prioritization method like NGT.
Ask the group: How do these values correspond to the present values? What should we change to get these values?
5. Critical Organisation Design Criteria
In the course of a strategic meeting, it is crucial to determine the best way to organize resources to take advantage of opportunities, defend against challenges from competitors, and make optimal use of the strengths we have. Although the process of creating an organization generally requires expertise in the field of job design, the responsibility of the definition of what kind of organization we would like to build and operate within is the responsibility of the top team.
Ask yourself: “in your opinion, what are the most important design concerns relating to the structure procedures and roles and reporting, performance management, and so on?”
In this phase, it is crucial to consider the ideal future organization instead of the current one. Take a look at the most important working processes and how this work is organized. For example, if we want to become more customer-focused, will we be able to organize our teams around our main customers and their needs.
Examine each criterion:
Why?
Implications?
Prioritize as needed, and find the show stoppers and key enablers.
6. Key Strategic Motors
As a summary, you can ask this question: “What are the 2 to 4 most important driving forces for your organization’s strategic direction in the next 2-3 years?”
This should be done in silence since it gives individuals the opportunity to reflect on what they have learned from the SWOT and the CSFs Values, the Organization Design guidelines.
Make a list of everyone’s first drivers and then discuss the consequences
Not everyone’s second driver and then talk about.