Why Most Strategic Plans Fail and Gather Dust: They’re Focused on the Wrong Problems
All organizations make plans—but why do some plans make little to no impact, while others become catalysts for major transformation? What makes the difference between a plan that gathers dust and one that gathers momentum? Most often, it’s not the amount of effort put into it, or the level of participation, or the vision. All of these are important, yes, but there’s a crucial difference in Plans that pop and Plans that drop. The ones that drop are often focused on changing the wrong things. In 27 years of working with schools to create strategic plans, I’ve seen many well-intentioned plans that failed to create change because they: (1) Asked the wrong questions and (2) Lacked a framework that could foster long term, systemic change.
Often, strategic planning starts with questions like, “Where should we spend our money?” And ,“How do we get our buses to arrive at school on time?” But the real questions should be transformational things like, “How do we better leverage the resources we already have to raise students’ grade level performance?” Or, “How much time do our third graders need to work on math in order for 95% of them to master each of the topic areas on their grade level?” When leaders start by looking at budgets and logistics instead of focusing on the models they need in order to get better results, they miss opportunities to make lasting upgrades to their systems.
Uncovering deep issues requires earnest, consistent listening and encouraging an entire community to speak up. Listening is a full-time job in strategic planning: People lose faith quickly when they feel their voices were collected but not respected. True engagement means creating spaces where someone’s feedback can truly shape collective action and progress.
Listening is essential throughout the planning process, including implementation. But listening and gathering data alone won’t lead to achieving lasting results. Having a clear framework for change in a Strategic Plan is critical to achieving the higher goals. Ideally, great data connects insights to actions in a strong Plan. Data not connected to a framework for real action (such as how the data will be used to focus teachers on missing Math skills) will likely just lead to more noise and a lack of transformation.
The ultimate goal of every Strategic Plan is to help people to stay focused on achieving higher goals. Big Hairy Audacious Goals (BHAG) or 10X Goals—Aiming for having big impact will often lead to major systemic improvement. But it is not enough just to have big vision and a sweeping mission. Great strategic plans have SMART goals: Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant and Time-bound. These types of goals are essential for translating Big Vision into results. Without SMART Goals, there can be no accountability. And accountability for the goals is absolutely essential for real transformation. A strong plan builds ownership into every step. Accountability isn’t about assigning blame, it’s about ensuring everyone has a clear role in making change happen, and knows what to do, whom to communicate with, and how it all is going to get done.
Successful strategic planning is much more than just a document with goals written down—it’s not just a dream of a better future. It’s an active process of asking the right questions, listening deeply, interpreting data, setting concrete goals, and building ownership. When those pieces come together, your strategic plans will start transforming your systems and providing new opportunities that realize those dreams for your entire community.