4 Keys To Successful Strategic Planning On Distance With Your Team

When you start your own business, you firstly deal and work with a small number of people. However, as the company grows, you will be needed to interact with more and more people. And this is also valid for people that are team leaders. At first, the team you lead might be small. But as the product is developed and improved, you may need more team members.

Teams are in constant change; people come and go and every one of them is different. No one said that being a good leader is an easy thing to do. It is challenging but rewarding too.

According to essay paper writers from Custom Papers on leadership topics, strategic planning is an essential part of the road to success. And to make it successful, it needs to be effective. But we live in uncertain times. The coronavirus pandemic changed the way we work forever. Morning coffees with work colleagues will never be the same. Or at least for these moments.

Teams are working remotely and without that face-to-face contact, a feeling of alienation might appear. The team cohesion or performance might drop. And this makes collaboration among team members more difficult. This is what many leaders and strategic planners want to avoid, as you need every team member’s involvement to make it successful.

Because now we are forced to work most of our time remotely, strategic planning and other team activities must be done on distance. To engage all the members and make sure that all your online meetings are productive, we have gathered a list of 4 keys to successful strategic planning on distance with your team.

Effective Communication

When working remotely and being part of online meetings, it might be harder to focus than during face-to-face meetings. It might be also harder to communicate, as there is less body language present.

Effective communication is a key element of successful strategic planning on distance with your team. This strategic plan is about bringing together the company’s values, mission, vision, and goals. It is about identifying the needs, the current situation, and the gaps between them. It is about employees, motivation, work-life balance, job satisfaction, productivity, and performance.

A strategic plan is a complex and comprehensive one, that states the direction of development and improvement of the company for the next year.

This strategic plan can be made at lower organizational levels too. A leader can have strategic planning sessions with his team where they set the team goals together. Every team member needs to know that he can add value to this plan by sharing his ideas.

Leaders need to communicate effectively with their team and treat every team member equally. Listen actively to their opinion and ideas and treat them with respect. This will encourage them to open and share more ideas.

Engagement

A strategic plan cannot be done just by one or two team members. As you set the direction of improvement and development for the next time frame, you need the improvement of every team member involved in the process. This is a key detail that many people forget and not engaging key members can result in flaws and misallocation of resources in your strategic plan.

But how can you do this? Especially during these times when teams are forced to work remotely, the challenge might be greater. However, you might want to consider these tips that will help you make the online atmosphere more welcoming.

Start with small talk, help your team relax, and share news or funny things that happened at home. Slowly shift the discussion to more serious topics, but maintain a relaxed tone at the same time.

People get more engaged if they feel safe and if they are listened to. Feeling that they are still connected with their colleagues and sharing updates will make them feel more relaxed and at ease. And when people have these feelings, they are more creative and open to share their opinions.

To make a successful strategic plan with your remote team, you will want to create these small but powerful interactions between you.

Patience

Every man needs patience. And this strategic planning calls for it too. In an essay on strategic business planning, assignment help UK highlighted patience as a core asset for success. Many leaders that start a strategic planning process have high expectations. They want to finish the plan as rapidly as possible. Instead, they end up disappointed.

This happens because people do not understand that the process of strategic planning is a complex and highly important one. You need time to prepare the agenda, to set up the meetings, to discuss certain topics. There might also be conflictual opinions and hot topics.

One of the most common mistakes people make is cramming all the topics in one- or two-days’ agenda. Besides, they forget that people cannot focus for long periods and they need breaks.

Therefore, patience is one of the secret ingredients. This means giving time to discuss hot topics. This means planning short and concise online meetings instead of cramming them all in a single one. And it also means giving your team time to cope with and get used to this new working style. Patience is the key.

Set Expectations

One reason why strategic planning session might get derailed is that team members are not effective. Or because there are conflicts. One common source of conflicts and ineffectiveness is having different expectations.

The thing is, every human has its perspective, which is unique. They went through different life and work experiences and they might have different expectations. Discussing every member’s expectations, gathering them all in one place, and prioritizing them is a successful approach.

When people work towards the same goals, they can support each other more. Setting expectations means also sharing the process steps, the agendas, and your own expectations. Like this, the team will align its vision on the future and work with the same goal in mind.

Conclusion

The strategic planning session calls for time, effort, and hard work. Many businesses attempt to engage in this process, as it is essential for their development and improvement. Nowadays reality requires conducting these working sessions online, which may turn to be more challenging than before.

To ensure that the process of strategic planning will be successful, you need to communicate effectively and encourage the team members to do the same. It means setting common expectations and goals. It also means engaging all team members and valuing their ideas. The strategic planning process is also about patience. Be patient, do not rush things, and give space and time for ideas and analysis to develop.

Author Bio

Michael Gorman is a highly skilled freelance writer and proofreader from the UK who currently works at college paper writing service as well as research paper writing service where he provides everyday essay help for students. He is interested in topics such as leadership, team dynamics, and cohesion. Michael writes various blog posts every day. His hobbies are painting and photography.