Question 3
Have you ever been involved in strategic planning? If so, what worked, and what factors contributed to success? What did not work, and why not? What could be done to prevent the problem in the future?
My father owns a shop in my local shopping centre. During summer holidays, I always spent most of my time helping him to serve customers. He came together with other business owners to formulate a strategic plan for the market centre. I was involved in the process since the group appointed me as their secretary. The entire process was a success since all members of the group shared a common goal of seeing the place grow and transform into a commercial hub ( Berman, 2006, p. 74 ). Some of the things that did not work include achieving the desired milestones within the set time. The group did not manage to have a network of tarmacked roads and power supply within the small town because of the logistics of presenting the need to the relevant authorities. However, they could have achieved these objectives if there was earlier involvement of the development agencies in initial planning process.
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Question 4
Identify a problem that would benefit from a regional, community-based strategic planning approach. Then, define the problem, identify the organizations that should be involved, organizations or their leaders who could take the lead in pulling these organizations together and the actions of these leaders that would compel these organizations to come together (preferably by creating win-win situations, rather than using duress). Discuss the first steps of community-based actions that would get a community-based strategic planning process going.
The problem under discussion is infrastructural development focusing on the supply of electricity and construction of tarmacked roads in rural shopping centres. The problem is common in areas where new shops are being set up. The organizations that should be involved include local legislators, municipal, district, and township representatives. The legislator in this case would lead the public to oversee the planning and implementation of the projects. However, proper leadership should be under the district representative who is the closest authority to the village shopping centre. The leadership will be responsible for coordination of resource allocation and communication of the progress to other agencies. The first step of formulating the strategic plan would be establishing leadership and making consultations with all the relevant stakeholders ( Berman, 2006, p. 67 ). The next step would be identifying the needs in the community and focusing on the most urgent one. Finally, avenues of sourcing funds will be identified before the actual implementation.
Reference
Berman, E (2006). Performance and productivity in public and nonprofit organizations . Routledge.