Forget Buy-In.
You don't have to take people on the journey if you started it together.
4 weeks to decisions you've talked about for years.
I work with charity leadership teams and boards whose next strategy needs to change what the organisation does. The people who'll deliver the work need to influence the strategy while there are still choices to make.
Your last strategy was signed. What changed in the organisation?
If your last strategy was developed behind closed doors by the chief executive and the Board, you may recognise this: it was approved, but it didn't land. The culture didn't change, and people couldn't explain what the strategy meant for their work.
A tick-box strategy is one the Board can sign without anything in the organisation having to change. I use that phrase for a strategy that leaves difficult choices unresolved, assumes the culture will somehow change around it, or leaves people unsure what they own on Day 1.
If the people doing the work first see the strategy at its launch, they're left to work out what the decisions mean after you've made them. Starting together gives them a chance to change those decisions while they're still open.
Ask these questions about your last strategy.
What work did your last strategy stop?
You can't add work without removing work. The next strategy needs choices about existing work as well as new priorities, because the people delivering it need to know where the capacity will come from.
What culture does the new strategy need, and how far is it from the one you've got?
I use the Competing Values Framework to examine organisational culture and Working Genius to help people understand how they experience different kinds of work and collaborate. We need to understand the culture we've got and what changing it would require.
On Day 1, who does and decides what next?
Ownership needs to reach across the organisation. A manager should know what they own, which decisions they can make, and where they need someone else's agreement. We work through those questions while they can still change the strategy.
An environmental charity made 35 binding decisions across the engagement.
I facilitated a two-day trustee retreat for an environmental charity with about 50 staff, followed by 11 workshops over four weeks. Each workshop had one core question and defined outputs, with Board approval required within 48 hours before the next workshop could begin.
The outputs included an agreed theory of change explaining how the work should lead to impact, five strategic pillars, the themes organising the work, with explicit criteria for excluding work, and a chosen organisational culture with five values and observable behaviours for each.
We also agreed a decision-making framework using consent, where objections are worked through to find a way forward people can support, defined 14 community sub-groups and how the charity would engage with them, and agreed what each programme would stop, start, or continue. The work included testing mission and vision definitions word by word and designing how the transformation programme would be governed and organised.
I delivered the session records, Board memos, and presentation slides within 24 hours of each session. Those are completed outputs; I don't claim a later implementation result.
We develop the strategy while people can influence the decisions.
Vision to Value is my five-stage method: What We Have, How We Win, Why We Win, What We Do, and How We Deliver. I read the data and talk to people inside and outside the organisation before the workshops, ask the Board what it needs to approve, and design the work as a sequence of decisions, with named owners and deadlines.
I bring the people who know the work into the decisions it will affect, with the Board involved from the beginning. What staff and beneficiaries tell us informs the choices while they're open. We agree who has authority to make each decision, including those reserved for the Board, so participation has a clear purpose and the process can reach a conclusion.
V2V builds a strategy from the decisions your organisation needs to make.
What we have
- Customer or beneficiary needs
- Current strengths
- Constraints
- Possible futures
Informs the next stage.
How we win
- Expand what works
- Improve what underperforms
- Test new options
- Choose what matters
Narrows the next stage.
Why we win
- Strategy logic
- Theory of change
- Data and research
- Reasons to believe
Tests the next stage.
What we do
- Strategic choices
- Services or products
- Portfolio
- Enablers
Becomes the next stage.
How we deliver
- Capabilities and capacity
- Build, buy, borrow, or partner
- Roadmap and governance
- Measures and triggers
Bring me the strategy decisions your team keeps discussing.
The four-week offer fits a focused problem where the relevant data and research are available and the people involved can make time for the work. We agree the scope and timetable before we start, including what the Board needs to approve.
Can every strategy be finished in four weeks?
A focused strategy sprint usually takes four to six weeks. Wider research or a fixed Board timetable can need longer. We agree a timetable for the decisions your organisation needs to make.
Is implementation support included?
Implementation support is separately agreed. The strategy work needs to leave people knowing what they own, which decisions they can make, and what happens next.
Does starting together remove the need to communicate the strategy?
People still need to understand the decisions and how they affect their work. Involving them while choices are open gives them an opportunity to influence the strategy; communication continues as the work develops.
If you've got the what, I've got the how.
Tell me which decisions your team keeps discussing and the timetable you're working towards.