Strategic Plan Season Is Upon Us

For many nonprofits, the fourth quarter is more than year-end fundraising and budget closeout. It is also planning season.

Boards are looking ahead. Leadership teams are setting priorities for the coming year. Organizations are asking whether the strategic plan they approved two or three years ago still reflects reality. Others are realizing they never really had a strategic plan at all, just a collection of goals, ideas, and annual priorities.

Q4 is a natural time to ask a few basic questions:

Is our current strategy still relevant?

Do we need to refresh an existing plan?

Are we simply planning for next year, or do we need to step back and think about the next three years?

And, most importantly, do our priorities actually reflect what our data, stakeholders, and organization are telling us?

A good strategic plan should not begin with a blank template. It should begin with evidence.

That means looking at the information your organization already has: financial performance, program results, client or member data, fundraising trends, operating information, and other indicators of organizational performance. It also means listening to the people connected to your mission: board members, staff, clients, donors, volunteers, and community partners.

From there, the real work begins.

What are the organization’s strengths? Where are the weaknesses? What opportunities are emerging? What risks need to be addressed? Which issues actually deserve strategic attention, and which are simply part of normal operations?

Those findings should ultimately lead to a small number of clear priorities, measurable goals, strategic activities, and measures of success.

That process is important. It can also be expensive and time-consuming.

Traditional strategic planning engagements can cost thousands, sometimes tens of thousands, of dollars. For a small nonprofit, that can mean choosing between investing in planning and investing directly in the mission.

There is another option.

If you are ready to plan, you need an ally.

StrategyAlly is a guided strategic planning platform built specifically for nonprofits.

It helps organizations move through the planning process using their own data, stakeholder input, and leadership judgment. StrategyAlly helps analyze information, identify themes, structure planning conversations, develop priorities and goals, and ultimately bring the work together into a professional strategic plan.

The philosophy is simple:

Your people make the decisions. StrategyAlly guides the process.

You can begin the planning process for free. Upload your information, gather stakeholder feedback, work through the analysis, and start defining your strategic direction before making a purchase.

When your strategy is ready, StrategyAlly turns that work into a completed strategic plan and gives you tools to keep managing it throughout the year.

So whether Q4 means refreshing an old plan, preparing for the year ahead, or defining the next chapter of your organization, this may be the right time to start.

Your mission. Your strategy. Your ally.