Strategic Planning Steps

Strategic Planning Steps

HCM 640 DB 1

A strategic plan is usually structured and sequential process that involved the future of the entire health care organization that is then translated from their mission and vision statement into measurable goals and objectives. There is a variety of approaches used in strategic planning it is often develop based on the nature of the organizational leadership, culture, and complexity of the organization's (Swayne, Ginter, & Duncan, 2006). Strategic planning is a strategic component of the management process that involves careful planning in an effort to map out the direction of the organization future. The process should consists of the organization mission and vision and then formulate goals and objectives that coincide with the mission and vision statement (Swayne, Ginter, & Duncan, 2006).

Strategy and the planning associated with creating and implementing it is all about the results, the hospital that I am employed implemented a 5-year strategic plan for the organization future and the plan has been in effect for 1 year. As, I began to evaluate the planning process I started with identifying the overall goals of the strategic plan and to determine whether the goals were being implemented. This included the who, what, when, where and how these tasks were accomplished.

A strategic plan describes what organizational strengths, their weaknesses, what there opportunities, (SWOT) this will provide an outline the directions of the organization over a five years period. The evaluation phase is a step that must not be over look the evaluation process show the effectiveness of the strategies that are necessary to move the organization forward. The time frame for evaluating the plan will be varies based on the goals and strategies of the organization's needs, which should be done on a yearly basis. It is during the evaluation phase that a organization will be able to determine if the strategy that they have in place has been working and what area might need some adjusting to get the strategy back on track (Dessler, 2008). Despite organization best intentions, even the best laid out goals and objectives are not met for one reason or another.

In a situation of this nature, I think that the most appropriate way to evaluate this plan is to compare the progress that is made by this plan with the overall objectives that are sought to be accomplished by the strategic plan. In essence, due to the fact that the strategic plan is comprised of five years, then at least 20% of the overall objectives should be completed during each year that the strategic plan is in effect. Due to this factor the proper way to evaluate this plan is to ascertain as to whether or not at least 20% of the overall objective of the strategic plan has been completed. This evaluation would entail ascertaining what