Strategic Planning Overview

The Strategic Planning Process

Strategic planning is a critical component of good management and governance. The strategic planning process helps the University's Board, President, and senior management to set clear policy and programming objectives. It helps to ensure that the University remains relevant and responsive to the needs of its community, while contributing to its stability and growth. Strategic planning provides the University a way of monitoring progress and helps to provide direction and focus for all of the University's faculty and staff. It's about projecting into the future and the steps needed to get there.

Strategic planning includes analysis, direction and action. Strategic analysis, in our situation refers to an environmental scan which includes stakeholder consultation, organizational review and an examination of the external environment (for example, of the political, social, economic and technical environment). This analysis helps us to carefully come to conclusions about what the University must do as a result of the major issues and opportunities facing us. These conclusions include what overall accomplishments (or strategic goals) the organization should achieve, and the overall methods (or strategies) to achieve the accomplishments. Finally, we then plot out the action required to achieve our goals. Action plans typically require that we identify the specific responsibilities, timelines, methods of monitoring, measurement of achievement and budgets.

Strategic Planning sets the direction for the organization as a whole. The strategic planning process we are discussing here for the University is at the "corporate" level. This is strategic planning targeted at the University as a whole. Corporate strategy provides the overall direction to the University by providing specific direction to key areas such as financial stability, academic programming and support; marketing; organizational development and; human resources, in order to achieve success.

Strategic Planning is planning beyond the next year or the next two years – it's about the continuous work for our next 35 years. As our external environment changes around us we must be response able and proactive. This includes the rapidly changing needs, wants and demands of our communities and the University's work to address these through a clearly articulated vision and mission as well as, organization priorities, policy and objectives.