Principled Innovation LLC

Why strategic planning strangles innovation

December 10th, 2006

WARNING: This is a very long post. You may prefer to grab the audio.

Last month, I posted the first of a three-part series on strategy and innovation in associations. In this second post, I want to share a few thoughts about how the approach most associations take to strategic planning actually strangles innovation. The final post, which I will put up before the Christmas holiday, will offer suggestions on how to minimize the impact of these inherent flaws.

Defenders of strategic planning’s association hegemony probably will roll their eyes when they read this post, and they will certainly disagree with my arguments. I welcome the debate, because it is absolutely essential that we clearly identify the stark differences between those who are invested in status quo thinking and those who are not. Leaders in the association world are long overdue to recognize that if we are going to drive the effort to create the future of our organizations, rather than have our future defined for us by others, we must radically rethink how we engage in the work of strategy and innovation.

Looking through this lens, here are three critical problems with association strategic planning that make it virtually impossible for any kind of meaningful innovation to emerge:

1. Strategic planning does not value capability and inclusivity.
2. Strategic planning does not value possibility and opportunity.
3. Strategic planning does not value sustainability and responsibility.

Those of you who pay close attention to this blog will notice that these three points focus on the six core values of innovation that I have written about here before. To simplify and clarify the arguments I want to make, I have placed the six values into their related pairs.

Strategic planning does not value capability and inclusivity–The strategic planning process rarely, if ever, challenges leaders to deeply question their assumptions about whether the association’s on-going activities are the right things to do based on the operating environment, unmet/unarticulated member needs and organizational capabilities. For proof, take a look at just about any association strategic plan. What does it contain? A litany of goals, objectives, strategies and tactics organized around a small number of familiar programs. The words and numbers may change, but the fundamental logic in favor of doing more of the same does not.

Similarly, leaders almost never ask hard questions about the association’s mix of current capabilities and whether it requires an upgrade to enable on-going value creation for members and customers in the future. Indeed, meaningful discussion of either short-term or long-term organizational capabilities typically is not an element of the strategic planning conversation. This is because strategic planning is about organizing programs for top-down control, not about building capable organizations that are able to function through middle-bottom-up coordination and collaboration. Moreover, many association leaders are not comfortable with in-depth dialogue around organizational capabilities, possibly because the subject is beyond the scope of their knowledge and experience, or perhaps because they realize that responding to member demands–no matter how ill-considered–almost always trumps a realistic appraisal of association capabilities. The failure to properly address the issue of capabilities is a root cause of the non-strategic “all things to all people” reality that so many associations struggle with today. Without either a framework or the intrinsic motivation for thinking about capabilities, then, leaders simply do not talk about them.

The desire for top-down control also defines who actually participates in strategic planning. Overwhelmingly, association strategic plans are developed by a small number of hierarchical elites from the board, usually in conjunction with the staff. The strategic planning process doesn’t embrace the deep and direct engagement of a broader universe of stakeholders because that kind of variety interferes with the need to converge toward an artificial consensus, i.e., groupthink, as quickly as possible. More voices only increases the likelihood of dissent, and strategic planning abhors dissent. The design of strategic planning processes makes it easy for leaders to fill the void created by the absence of divergent opinions with the kind of convergent thinking around logistics and tactics that most board members find more psychologically satisfying because it creates the illusion of progress.

Innovation is all about building stronger and more capable associations that can create distinctive value for members and customers. Giving everyone who wants one a role to play in the effort to create unique and compelling offers is an essential ingredient of sustainable success. So it is very unfortunate that association strategic planning doesn’t accept and embrace these core beliefs of innovation.

Strategic planning does not value possibility and opportunity–Since strategic planning is about helping leaders maintain their control, it seeks to squelch fresh thinking about creating member value. Envisioning new possibilities is regarded as less productive than arranging (and re-arranging) current activities, and the “ticking clock” phenomenon of calendar-driven strategic planning retreats, i.e., we only have so many hours over so many days to get this done, favors efficiency in dealing with minutiae at the expense of the genuine creativity of effective strategic dialogue. The artificial time constraints of strategic planning limit the scope of inquiry and exploration for creativity, making it easier for strategic planning participants to tinker with minor improvements and extensions of current offerings than it is to invent brand new value-creating approaches and concepts.

The flip side of possibility, which is the fruit of the human imagination, is opportunity. Opportunities emerge when we apply our intellectual capabilities and knowledge resources to possibilities, i.e., we allow big questions and powerful new concepts to take shape as real-world offers the organization can introduce to create new value for members and customers. Unfortunately, strategic planning leaves virtually no room for constituencies to form around emerging opportunities, largely because it is impossible for advocates of those ideas to provide absolute proof of risk-free success. So while leaders occasionally pay lip service to exploring opportunities, the unspoken assumption of the elite group is that nothing at all will come of them, certainly not until the organization’s “real work” is done. In other words, many of our associations’ most senior staff and volunteer leaders, for the most part, do not regard innovation as real work, and it is our community’s commitment to strategic planning that is at least partially to blame for this mindset.

Strategic planning does not value sustainability and responsibility–Consistent with its basic ignorance of organizational capabilities and its deep resistance to new possibilities, strategic planning does not push association leaders to think deeply about the long-term financial sustainability of their organizations in a time of real paradigm shift. The traditional association business model is under severe threat in today’s marketplace, and the consistent and disciplined pursuit of innovation is most likely the only viable strategy for building new business models that will secure the future of our organizations. Strategic planning doesn’t concern itself with this crucial issue, however, preferring instead to focus leaders’ attention on operational considerations that can be addressed without the significant investment of time, attention and energy resources.

The many flaws and failures of strategic planning presented in this post conspire to make it virtually impossible for association leaders to fully appreciate and internalize the depth and breadth of the responsibilities they have for the intelligent stewardship of the association enterprise. In today’s association community, strategic planning is a pro forma exercise, despised by many participants who see it as a waste of time, disdained by many staff and volunteers who see it as meaningless to what they do and, ironically, largely disregarded by many of the very senior decision-makers who drive it, when they place greater emphasis on personalities and politics than on strategic insight and foresight. As long as strategic planning remains the prevailing approach for structuring the work of our organizations, innovation will never be a priority, and that is no longer a tenable position for the association community.

Now is the time for truly capable and responsible association staff and volunteer leaders to make sober assessments of their organizations’ strategic options for future success in an effort to wrap their minds around a fundamental inquiry: going forward, what will make the difference between our association being an impact player and being an also-ran in our profession, industry or field? If fulfilling mission and making a real difference is the answer, we must end strategic planning’s stranglehold on the association community and on our pursuit of genuine innovation. We need a new direction in associations and now is the time for our leaders to make it happen.

Coming up in Part III–How do you make innovation a priority despite the shortcomings of strategic planning?

UPDATE: The audio feed truncates the post, stopping in the middle of the first sentence of the last paragraph.

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