Revisit Your Strategy In Quarterly Planning

Quarterly Planning sessions are meant to define key initiatives that will be focused on over the next 90 days in support of your company's BHAG (Big Hairy Audacious Goal; your 10-25 year objective). 

Quarterly Planning for a 13-week race is fundamental to ongoing progress toward long-term company goals.  However, an often overlooked, or under attended, element of quarterly planning is attention to key strategy items.  

If your company utilizes the One Page Strategic Plan, you know that the overall goal of quarterly planning sessions is to help you maintain focus and alignment to your BHAG by chipping away bit by bit, quarter over quarter until you have accomplished your goal.

Even so, most companies tend to be overlook, or only briefly address, long-term strategic plans during quarterly planning sessions.  The danger in this oversight comes in the form of losing focus and direction and creating short-term plans that do not align to your BHAG.  Often ideas that seem good as a quarterly priority don't actually serve the realization of long-term goals, but rather move you away from your strategic mark.  

So, when opening your quarterly planning session, it is important that you spend time reviewing the following:

• Core Values and Core Competencies
• Core Purpose, BHAG, Profit/X
• Brand Promise and Brand Promise Guarantee
• Opportunities and Threats
• Core Customer and Sandbox

Taking time to revisit your strategy items in quarterly planning sessions will help ensure that you not only stay focused and aligned to your BHAG, but also provides the opportunity and insight to identify gaps in your plan and make necessary adjustments.

If you are a Rhythm Systems client and would like to learn more about connecting quarterly planning to strategy, visit Rhythm University and view Verne Harnish's video link for "Mastering the Rockefeller Habits" or contact your Rhythm Systems Coach.