Peter Drucker defined strategic planning as, “the continuous process of making present entrepreneurial or risk-taking decisions systematically and with the greatest knowledge of the futurity; organizing the efforts needed to carry out these decisions; and measuring the results of the expectations through organized, systematic feedback.”

That’s a pretty good description of what we’re doing when we do a strategic retreat, planning session or gathering.

However, what are you really trying to accomplish with a retreat? Couldn’t a Level 5 leader, to use a Good To Great reference, figure out the risk-taking decisions, gain knowledge of the future, organize efforts, and measure results? So, why then do we gather people together to work on the above definition?

Here is why we actually bring teams, boards and diverse people together for a strategic retreat:

1). To Create Dissatisfaction With Where We Are

First, we retreat to create dissatisfaction with where we are. We know in order to create a proper change initiative or, in this sense, to create a new vision or strategic plan moving forward, we need to involve the most important players at the table to create dissatisfaction with where we are. In fact, if we don’t create enough dissatisfaction in the group, you’ll often get half-hearted participation, confusion of why we’re there, or division among the group.

What is dissatisfaction? It is uncomfortable; usually there is some pain. For movement or acceptance to occur, we must recognize that it has to become uncomfortable for us to stay where we are.

If we are not uncomfortable or there is not enough dissatisfaction with where we are, then why are we taking hours out of our normal day to retreat and create something new? In order to create something new, we must be displeased with where or what we currently are.

70% of strategic plans fail not because of the strategy or wrong vision, it's because we haven’t created enough dissatisfaction with where we are and our people become lost, confused or indifferent.

Recommended Tool:

We often recommend that leaders actually write out a Case for the Strategic Retreat document detailing why the retreat, and really change, must occur. This Case should be given to each member of the retreat prior to actually meeting.

The Case for a Strategic Retreat addresses questions such as:

What is the background for the retreat? What has led up to this need to change?
What challenges or problems are we facing in the current situation that will cripple us if we don’t begin addressing them today? What is the impact of these challenges?
What will happen if we stay the same? Why should we retreat now?
What are we going to have to let go of and why?
What will the change require? What will it cost us to change? What will it cost us if we don’t change?
How will we know when we have succeeded?

2). To Create a Compelling Vision

Once we have accomplished creating a dissatisfaction with where we are, we have to be able to effectively communicate where we are going.

An interesting note about strategic planning and change is that there are typically two types of people present: those who lead and those who follow. Those who lead are on either end of the spectrum (resistors to the strategic plan, vision or change and champions of the strategic plan, vision or change). They are either for or against the retreat, leading the group forward into uncharted territory, or leading the group back to familiar ground.

The second type of people are those who follow and typically rest in the middle of the spectrum. They tend to end up following whichever person seems to have a better idea of where they are going and how they want to get there.

Knowing that, we must always be sure that we have a clear vision of the goal we’re trying to reach and the approach we’re going to use. Sharing that with people at every opportunity becomes our passion, as we know the resistance is also actively recruiting to their side.

Recommended Tool:

A clear and compelling vision can be easily captured and communicated by using the 5 Ps: Purpose, Picture, Plan, Performance Measure and Part. When these are all put together you have your elevator speech to “sell” the retreat or vision:

Purpose: Creating the purpose for why we need to change is a critical first step (hint: go back to your Case for a Retreat doc).
Picture: People remember visuals more than they do words. So our next step is to create a metaphor or example that sticks with the person after we’re gone.
Plan: People generally can only remember clusters of three or four concepts at a time. So, we need to keep our plan simple and memorable.
Performance Measure: It’s important that our elevator speech lets people know what success will look like.
Part: Here is the most critical piece of the elevator speech. We need to give the person a specific task that they can do that will help move the quality change along.

3). To Get The Right People To Support It and Work It

In any retreat we are trying to get the right people in the right seats going in the right direction. Hopefully, your efforts around creating dissatisfaction and a compelling vision has gotten you halfway there with people.

It’s important to remember that strong resistors to a retreat, strategic plan or new vision really only make up about 8-15% of any total group. However, a similar percentage exists on the other side as champions. Sitting in the middle are those people who are followers; on the sidelines waiting to see how the process will go. The race is on when we initiate the strategic planning process to get these followers over to the champion, supportive-of-the-initiative side. However, without our Case for a Retreat or the Compelling Vision, we have little to convince the followers other than a few first, fumbling steps in the direction we’re supposed to be heading. It doesn’t take long for the resistor to point out the negatives and win the followers over. We’ve all either been there or seen this in our organizations, boards, and communities.

So, in our retreat, before we launch the big vision or change, we are actively working to convince our team, our board, our leadership that a retreat, and more importantly, a new vision or change is necessary.

Recommended Tool:

The organizer of the retreat (board chair, executive director, president), should try to connect with every attendee before the retreat. The organizer should start with actively listening to challenges, opportunities and other concerns each member has. Eventually, when the member has shared what they need to share, this is the opportunity for the organizer to use the Case for a Retreat and the 5 Ps to begin to describe some possible positive outcomes of the retreat and the strategic planning process. It should be done with passion, excitement, facts, and a we-need-you-too attitude.

The problem with strategic planning is that most people don’t know how to do it. The anxiety caused by needing to find solutions keeps people trapped in a “what can we fix right now” mindset. Strategic retreats are an amazing opportunity to dream, to look into the future, and to quench that anxiety with a well thought out, and bought in plan.