Canadian HR Reporter

28 www.hrreporter.com organization had to implement it. Of course, this led to somewhat hit-and-miss outcomes." Morissette says strategic planning has evolved over the past decade into a collective and collaborative exercise. In the best organizations, senior leadership teams engage multiple stakeholders in the process, including employees, vendors and clients. They also conduct extensive market analyses and research current trends. Today's inclusive and evidence-based strategic plans highlight four or five key priorities, synthesizing multifaceted sources of information. They unify the organization through a broad, actionable, compelling purpose, giving individual departments the latitude they need to collaborate to produce system-wide outcomes based on organizational cohesiveness and unity. "Modern plans break down silos so that goals can be realized across the organization," says Brenda Barker Scott, an author, educator and one of the founders of the Organizational Development programs at Queen's IRC. "In the past, we relied on the hierarchy to stitch the organization together, with each function identifying individually how they would contribute to the strategic plan. Today's strategies rely on networks of people connecting across traditional silos to deliver the right product and service innovations, and to do so quickly and efficiently. To achieve this, strategies must define priorities for direction and align teams of employees working together to iteratively shape solutions and implement them." Barker Scott notes that, as we shift from hierarchies to networks, the strategic priorities will give work meaning and provide the glue that guides and aligns plans allow for detailed action, they also lack the rigidity of the to-do list. A strategic plan in the old model might have stated that the municipality needs to attract a big hotel chain to accomplish its diversification goals. Today's strategic planning methods mean functional units can innovate to find solutions that fit within the broad strategy. A balance is struck between big-picture thinking and detailed action to better facilitate success. The IRC is mobilizing Morissette and Barker Scott's expertise to help leaders take advantage of this "reassessment moment" through an expansion of the Organizational Development programs offered by the IRC. "Brenda understands how teams collaborate and the impact of organizational design and systems thinking," Stephanie Noël says. "Françoise knows how to leverage talent to build the in-house talent organizations need to thrive in the future." IRC organizational development programs guide organizations as they re-assess, develop their plans and implement them holistically. Noël and her team know that the concerns of the present are dominating thinking within organizations. As we begin to understand the new normal, however, HR departments and senior leaders will need to reflect, prepare and innovate. "Our programs are designed to support leaders as they intentionally design their workplaces with a vision of collaborative contribution and safe spaces for new ideas," says Noël. "This is an important time for planning and exploring. Working together, we' ll be able to face these challenges and embrace new capabilities and opportunities." CHRR efforts and how people contribute — reframing organizational management thinking from defining people by their roles to defining roles by their people. "Through that mindset, the organization's strategic plans are realized through the will, efforts and ingenuity of people, as they connect to make the strategies happen," she says. This broader approach to informing strategic planning can radically improve ser vice and reveal new opportunities to increase customer satisfaction. And although they forego the old "to- do list" model in favour of more broad strategic objectives, Morissette and Barker Scott agree that they still allow for detailed objectives within their goals. Morissette cites the example of a municipal strategic plan with a big goal of economic renewal and diversification. Within that goal are more detailed operational plans: one for attracting new businesses, another for encouraging local entrepreneurship and another for improving technology infrastructure. She notes that while the strategic goal and operational "The COVID-19 crisis spurs all of us to reflect on where we have been, where we are and where we're going." Stephanie Noël, Director, Queen's IRC ORGANIZATIONAL DEVELOPMENT LEADERSHIP SERIES Stephanie Noël Françoise Morissette Brenda Barker Scott

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