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Donate Now!Strategic Planning for Nonprofits
heather | 5 Jan 2007 - 16:33
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A Strategic Plan is a multi-year planning document which focuses on the entire organization and not just one specific program or component. Although there are many ways to write a strategic plan, I learned how to write a strategic plan including these key components:
STEP Analysis (An analysis of all the external factors that effect the organization.)
- Socio-cultural factors
- Technological factors
- Economic Forces
- Political/Legal Forces
Porters Five Forces (Also describing the external forces that effect the organization).
- Industry
- Suppliers
- Competitors
- Buyers
- Substitutes
- Rivalry
SWOT Analysis (An analysis of all the internal factors within an organization).
- Key Strengths
- Key Weaknesses
- Opportunities
- Threats
- Overall Strategic Plan Goal
- Fundraising Strategy
- Results Desired in Fundraising
- Management Strategy
- Results Desired in Management
- Human Resources Strategy
- Results Desired in Human Resources
- Program Strategy
- Results Desired in Program
Implications and Costs
Evaluation Methods
Conclusion
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Strategic planning and SWOT
That’s a good short summary, Heather. I’d like to suggest an expansion to the way you’ve presented the “SWOT” analyses.
SWOT is both internal and external: The Strengths and Weaknesses (SW) are those that are internal to your organization. What are you really, really good at? What is it you don’t manage quite so well?
The Opportunities and Threats (OT) are environmental, or external — new trends, for example, that may make your service more desireable; or new competitors who may cut into your client base.
You can use the STEP analysis as a kind of check list for covering different types of potential opportunities and threats. It’s not so much a different part of the process, as a way of looking at opportunities and threats.
Ok, so you’ve done your SWOT and you have these four lists — how are you going to make sense of them? One good way is to shuffle them into a SOWT. Seriously.
It sounds a bit complicated, but it can be a very powerful analytic tool. The idea is to pair up your Strengths with your Opportunities (SO), and your Weaknesses with your Threats (WT).
Why? Because an opportunity that plays into your strengths is like low-hanging fruit. It’s something on which you can easily capitalize. And, by the same token, a threat that plays to your Weakness may represent a more-than-usually significant danger, something you’ll need to give close attention.
Going that last step — turning your SWOT into a SOWT — can help you quickly sort out the key learnings and directions for your organization.
Strategic planning and SWOT
Thanks Doug for providing a great description of SWOT!