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During #AMAHigherEd State of the Institute panel, one president just said they don't believe in strategic planning. Agree that strategic planning warrants some scrutiny. But there’s tremendous opportunity if it’s approached in a more human-centered, results-oriented way. 1/9
In our work, we’ve noticed a lot of similarities across plans, so we @rhbinformed undertook a detailed study of 100+ current strategic plans in 2020. We shared some findings during the #AMAHigherEd Senior Leader Experience. A few themes and opportunities for marketers... 2/9
We saw an overall lack of student-centricity across plans, reflecting that plans are often built for the institution by the institution. Important questions for marketers to pose before and during the process: What is strategic planning for, and who’s it for? 3/9
Plans tended to have a bias more toward planning than strategy. (Does your plan contain items you should be doing anyway? Strategy should lead to behavior change.) Also, marketing was represented across plans almost exclusively through the lens of Promotion. 4/9
Of the 108 plans, we identified 16 as the most strategic. These institutions undertook a sometimes brutally honest self-examination, were willing to make outcomes (not the process) the focus and demonstrated coherence across all areas of the plan. 5/9
For #AMAHigherEd, Dr. @AimeeHosemann did a deep dive on DEI, the most frequently mentioned priority across plans. Among the plans that exhibited the most strategic tendencies, DEI was not merely one of the priorities/goals, but an essential element of the entire plan. 6/9
The language of diversity and inclusion, which varied widely across plans, was in a sense a proxy for the strategic value of the plans more generally. Marketers can help their institutions be more explicit about what these terms mean and how they can be meaningfully measured. 7/9
We suggest that holistic views of campus life, as evidenced through diversity planning, demonstrate that planning teams – w/ the help of marketers – can take a more human-centered & results-oriented perspective, rather than just an institution-centered & process-oriented one. 8/9
We’re currently writing the final report and finishing up follow-up interviews with presidents. If you’d like to be among the first to receive this report, let me know. We @rhbinformed hope this research will spur some new and different approaches to strategic planning. 9/9
