EVALUATE STRATEGY
How to evaluate the
end result of a strategic planning workshop.
By Ruth Tearle
The end result of a successful strategic planning retreat is a powerful strategic plan, plus a team that is united and excited about their future.
What should you expect from your strategic planning workshop? How do you know if your strategy retreat was a mere pretence or a success? It all depends on what your team has achieved by the end of your strategic planning workshop.
1. Evaluate your strategic plan
A powerful strategic plan meets these evaluation criteria. It:
- Provides a a clear description of the markets that the organization will and won’t compete in, in the future.
- Takes into account new trends or shifts in the political, social, economic, technological, industry and competitive environments surrounding the organization and its customers.
- Shows how future trends will affect what their future customers will value and be prepared to pay for.
- Contains a number of creative opportunities to take advantage of the new strategic trends.
- Gives a clear reason why a future customer will choose to support their organization, rather than any of their future competitors.
- Contains a mix of exciting products and services that their chosen target market will love, want to buy, and will want to share with their friends.
- Shows what will need to be in place within the organization, to ensure it is able to exploit the opportunities and achieve its competitive advantage.
- Is something the group is capable of achieving, and wants to achieve.

2. Evaluate the likelihood of your plan being implemented
In addition to developing a powerful strategic plan, an effective strategy workshop provides a number of people or team benefits:
- People who used to belong to different silos or divisions, now act as a united team.
- There is more positive energy as the team is excited about the future and the plan they have created to be successful within that future.
- The team has learned how to think in a creative and customer focused way.
- Individuals are positive about the future as they see a role for themselves to contribute to something exciting and meaningful.
- All of this, makes it easier to implement a strategic plan, as most of the resistance normally associated with implementation, has been replaced by excitement.

A powerful strategic planning retreat ends with a team that:
- Has clear direction
- Has a clear picture of their future
- Has put their own creative touch onto their picture of the future.
- Is excited about their future and the contribution each of them can make to this future.
Such a strategy is more likely to be implemented successfully, in a way that truly benefits the organization.
You may also like:
- Resources for organizational strategyA library of practical articles, guides and tools on organizational strategy.
- Resources for team strategyA library of practical articles, guides and tools for doing strategy at a team level.
- A step-by-step guide to developing a strategic plan.A step-by-step guide to strategic planning. Use it to develop a strategic plan that you would be proud to present to your board of directors. Or use it to develop a common vision to guide your organization.