SAVE THE DATE ! 
HBR OF CNY Board Planning Session

Wednesday November 20, 2024
​9:00 a.m. - 3:00 p.m. 

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Mission has a pivotal place in strategic planning, the process that seeks the strategic fit between the mission of an organization and its internal strengths and external opportunities.  Strategic planning develops a shared dream among the stakeholders of an organization and produces a blueprint for hot to achieve that dream.
The strategic planning process is the perfect time for board members to consider their dreams and visions for an organization and to articulate the essence of its values.  It gives board members the time and authorization to visualize, ponder, and debate the  future within the context of known realities and facts.  As Doug Eadie observes in Boards That Work: A Practical Guide to Building Effective Association Boards. "Planning surely has no peer as a vehicle for a board's exercise of creative, foresightful leadership."
So why does strategic planning sometimes conjure up at worst a sense of fear and at best a feeling of ambivalence, instead of those heady dreams and visions?  Strategic planning experiences too often become bogged down in an endless cycle of meetings, sabotaged by outspoken naysayers or derailed by leaders uncommitted to the process and its results.  Any potential to truly scrutinize the mission and envision the possibilities is squashed at the door.
Visioning fits into planning because strategic planning incorporates a change model - and change can be an intrinsic trait of an organization's vision.  An organization that conducts strategic planning must be willing to change direction if necessary and imagine what that direction might look like.