The Benefits of Planning

We live in a highly polarized society in which we routinely place labels on individual citizens and categorize issues as black/white or right/wrong depending on our political and socio-economic leanings. However, if you look past the headlines, most people and issues don’t fit neatly into the boxes we’ve assigned them to.

As a business leader, how can you make an impact on bringing humans closer together? How can you build the skills of consensus-building and collaboration in current and future generations of citizens?

A part of the answer is getting more team members involved in rigorous and consistent goal setting and planning that’s underpinned by the principles of organizational health and continuous improvement.

Goals should not be “handed down from on high” and should instead be developed in a more collaborative fashion. The process starts each year with a reaffirmation of the company’s vision / north star, followed by development of the long-range plan, and concludes with the build of the comprehensive annual budget. While the budget is being finalized, team and individual goals should also be set to ensure optimal organizational alignment.

Goals should “flow” down, through, and across the organization.

At each step through the annual planning process, the process of “catchball” should be employed to get the feedback and opinions of as many voices and perspectives as possible to influence the plan. Research from companies like McKinsey have shown that companies who embrace diversity, inclusion, and organizational health perform better than those who operate in directive, uniform, low-trust environments. Trust is built over time when goals are clear, teams are aligned, roles/responsibilities are well-established, and individual contributors understand the value they’re creating for customers day-in, day-out.

My point is this. If companies perform better by building trust-based working environments through diversity, inclusion, and collaboration, it shouldn’t be a long leap to make to assume we could build a more peaceful, productive society if we learned to apply the collaboration, teamwork, and active listening skills used in corporate planning to our roles as active and engaged citizens who contribute to a better tomorrow.

Planning is hard. Gaining consensus is hard. Actively listening to other opinions is hard. Taking critical feedback onboard and acting on it is hard. It’s a lot easier to bark out orders and fall in line behind a single point of view or convenient narrative.

Let’s take the road less traveled and forge new paths forward.

Grace. Dignity. Compassion.

Andy