The Most Important Priority to Include in Your Strategic Plan

I sometimes get asked if there is one objective I'd recommend every organization include in their strategy. If I had one, it would be this:

Prioritize your people.

Before you give me the "yeah, yeah, yeahs" or say "I do care about our people!" or say "I'd love to, but..."

Let's talk about some hard truths.

1 > Your people are how your strategy and mission get fulfilled.

Writing ideas down on paper or mapping out a strategic plan can be helpful, but strategy is only successful if the humans who need to execute it know what they need to do, have the capacity to do it, and know why they're doing it. If your staff doesn't understand the strategy, it's not getting done. Which leads us to hard truth #2.

2 > You have less capacity - and fewer people - than you think.

My most-read LinkedIn posts last year were about a critical metric that not enough leaders know - their vacancy rate.

Too often, plans are made with a complete and fully onboarded team in mind. That is not reality, and creating strategy based on different strengths, capacity, and assets than what you actually have - or can sustainably achieve in the next few years - isn't strategic at all.

Also, according to the recent Social Impact Staff Retention Survey conducted by Michelle Flores Vryn, CFRE and Evan Wildstein, about three-quarters of the people in your organization - especially programs staff and marketing staff - are looking for a new job this year.

Even if these folks don't actually leave, that's a whole lot of disengaged or burned-out team members who aren't being motivated or rewarded in a way that enables them to work at their full capacity or to their full potential.

3 > You have the power to do something about it.

Many executives I work with want to prioritize their people, but they aren't sure how to, have never seen this articulated in a strategy, or feel they can't due to pressure from the Board. So, instead, they continue to push change or new initiatives that the team doesn't have capacity for or wonder how best to motivate their team despite way-less-than-ideal circumstances.

Folks - that is not how humans work.

As a leader, there are many things you can do to make things easier for your team, increase their motivation, or support them with the right kinds of communication at the right moment.

But to do that, you need to be curious about your people, need to give them space and time to grieve during times of change (since all change involves some kind of loss), and need to create an environment and realistic timeline in which they - and the strategy - can succeed.

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Follow these links for more about vacancy rates and why you need to understand them to plan and budget effectively.