Managers have their own values ​​and their own ambitions when setting direction and goals. But he has to take into account the external environment and his own strengths, so the final goal is always a compromise of these things, which is often subjective. Generally speaking, the final direction goal is never a person's wish.

It’s about finding the balance between the environment and opportunities and your own organizational resources. It is necessary to find the best set of activities so that they can best play to the strengths of the organization and achieve the goals of the organization as quickly as possible. The opportunities considered by these policies and constraints are opportunities that have not yet appeared, and the resources considered are resources that are being sought.

This is a near-term task, and the responsibility of planning lies in matching opportunities and resources. But what is considered here is the current situation, or the situation in the near future. Since it is a short term, sometimes optimal plans can be made to achieve the best indicators. The manager or factory director thinks he has achieved the best time balance, but this is still subjective and the actual situation is difficult to completely match.

What do we want to do? What do we want to do? -- Determine the target

what can we do? What might we do? -- Determine direction

what can we do? What can we do? -- Find a balance between environment and opportunities and your own organizational resources

What should we do? What should we do? -- Make a plan

The answers to these questions are based on the individual leader's recognition of opportunities, their personal evaluation of the organization's strengths and weaknesses, and their own values ​​and ambitions. All of this is not limited to reality, but also takes into account the future.

strategic planning framework

In highly uncertain environments, the advantages of scenario planning are obvious: since no base case can be considered likely to occur, planning needs to be based on assumptions (assuming several different possible futures), and The various potential drivers of uncertainty require heightened attention.

Scenario planning efforts are further complicated by the prevailing uncertainty: the number of variables at play—and the range of possible outcomes—has exploded in the last year. For example, consider the plight of an industrial supplier that is not only heavily impacted by the commercial and residential real estate industry, but also has many government customers. For the company, the most important uncertainties include: the direction of the business credit and mortgage markets, home prices, taxes, and government stimulus spending. The different outcomes of each of these uncertainties will make a huge difference in the development path of this company. As the core of scenario planning—conceiving multiple strategies for different outcomes—has become increasingly complex,1 strategists should develop more demanding processes of information gathering, possibility research, and completely old-fashioned rigorous thinking.

Executives who are not part of a strategic planning group—even those who are accustomed to developing scenarios—may find the variety and complexity of this year's scenarios confusing and overwhelming. It is critical to involve these executives early in the planning process: for example, start the planning process with a scenario-modeling approach that involves the entire executive team. Similarly, when the business unit review process begins, companies can invite executives from various departments to participate in the process—rather than maintaining a one-time working relationship between the executive team and each business unit leader. To inculcate how to correctly evaluate the threats faced by enterprises and the common response strategies of enterprises.

If the commercial and residential real estate markets have stabilized, it can expect that its business model will remain largely unchanged, although sales in these sales channels will be reduced until the economy recovers. If these markets soften further, the company's biggest market opportunity for the foreseeable future will be in infrastructure investments paid for by government stimulus spending. In this case, the company needs to reallocate its sales resources to the government-facing business area and focus on how to maximize sales in this area.

In short, the company's strategy must take into account possibilities that have expanded significantly compared to those of the recent past. Because the effectiveness of this strategy depends on an organization's ability to adjust quickly when things start to look uncertain, managers must identify and closely monitor key indicators that indicate which scenarios may unfold. For this industrial supplier, some of the most important metrics are: new and existing home sales, home foreclosure rates, mortgage rates, new housing starts, and announcements of "imminent construction" on government projects . Of course, the strategic planning process often reduces its underlying variables to an average forecast of market growth, although managers of the business need to keep track of these metrics at all times. However, given the current high level of uncertainty, the strategic planning team needs to break down the average forecast of market growth into its individual elements so that the possible outcomes corresponding to each indicator are more clearly visible and can be monitored in more detail. index.

It is not necessary for the strategic planning process to specify specific values ​​for these indicators - because these indicator values ​​should also help the enterprise make dynamic budget decisions in real time. This is critical because if cash is tight and executives intend to use it cautiously when planning uncertainty becomes less uncertain, identifying each operating unit at the beginning of the fiscal year budget allocation is meaningless. What businesses need today is a dynamic pay-as-you-go resource allocation process that preserves cash and drives adherence to the strategic roadmap laid out in scenario planning.

This year's strategic planning process should also result in very specific plans for monitoring the performance of suppliers, customers, and competitors. As we've seen over the past six months, some of the most established businesses can run into financial trouble with dizzying speed. Obtaining intelligence early can help companies determine when they should negotiate more favorable supply contracts with suppliers; when they should prepare to replace high-risk suppliers; when they should offer easier credit terms to key customers; and when they should step up efforts Collecting payment from a distressed customer; or when to preemptively acquire all or part of a distressed competitor. Key signs that a business is in trouble include common harbingers such as delinquent accounts payable, a downgrade in debt rating, a significant drop in stock price, delayed delivery times, and deterioration in product or material quality. While all of these symptoms are all too familiar to operations managers, they have typically been dealt with in an ad hoc manner rather than through a strategic planning process. Things are different this year.

Given the magnitude of the economic upheavals currently taking place, many planners will be tempted to focus all their attention on the unfolding economic crisis. This is a wrong approach, for at least two reasons.

First, while the current economic downturn may be very damaging, it is unlikely to reverse some fundamental market trends, such as the aging of consumers in Europe and North America, or the ongoing economic developments in Brazil, China, India, and Russia. , these trends will continue to create strategic opportunities and threats. So no matter what happens, business managers must focus their attention—and resources—on these trends.

Second, planners who are too preoccupied with the current economic crisis may run the risk of neglecting their core responsibility of assessing the effectiveness of existing strategies. While the crisis may force companies to shelve or revise certain parts of their strategies, other parts of their strategies will remain important even as the economic environment changes. This year's strategic planning process provides an opportunity for managers to take a hard look at which existing strategies are helping, hurting, and having no impact in response to the crisis, and to ensure that systems and measures are in place to effectively track their performance. . While all of this may sound like truisms, great uncertainty can easily make it easy for this common sense to go by the wayside.

McDonald's is one company that is developing a strategic plan. The company has remained profitable from its low-cost fast-food offerings during this economic downturn and has enjoyed the strongest sales growth for its fast-food chain in years. At the same time, executives remain laser-focused on long-term strategies, including updating more expensive stores; overhauling operations; upgrading coffee products; and launching a menu of healthy food options. Managers of other companies can learn many valuable lessons from McDonald's, which is trying to profit from the current economic environment while staying true to its long-term strategies and the underlying trends they reflect (such as healthier living). Way).

Despite these challenging times, this year’s strategic planning process does not have to be a fraught or futile exercise. Creating deeper scenarios, monitoring corporate strategy more closely, and maintaining a constant focus on long-term strategy will help strategists, making them more likely to develop strategies that can guide their companies through economic turmoil. planning.

(1) This kind of planning is generally a one-time decision-making process, and it cannot be tested in advance. Models and decision support systems established using some management science theories are often not recognized by managers. They like to use their own experience to build heuristic models. Due to their one-time nature, it is difficult to determine which one is correct.

(2) Most of the experts participating in the planning are personnel in the enterprise, and they are responsible for the future implementation of the plan. Since strategic planning always takes into account external changes, it requires internal changes to adapt to external changes. Such changes are often unpopular with these corporate personnel, so they may object when implementing such strategic plans. manner.

(1) Do a good job in ideological mobilization to let various personnel understand the significance of strategic planning, so that cadres at all levels can participate in the implementation of strategic planning. Senior personnel should be made aware of the benefits of recruiting external personnel to participate in planning, and they should be good at letting those who implement plans understand the intentions of those who formulate plans. New ideas for strategic plans of some large enterprises should often be consistent with the form of corporate culture, or in other words New content should be promoted in the same way that old businesses are used to it. Once the plan is made, don't change it easily.

(2) Treat planning activities as a continuous process. During the process of planning formulation and implementation, "evaluation and control" must be continuously carried out, that is, continuous integration of various plans and the management responsible for the execution of such plans, and continuous adjustment. A good strategic management should include the following contents: ①Establish operating principles; ②Determine the status of the enterprise; ③Establish strategic goals; ④Evaluate and control. These contents are dynamic and constantly modified throughout operations.

(3) Encourage new strategic thinking. The important core of strategic planning should be said to be strategic thinking. Often, the importance of strategy is ignored due to many urgent tasks in daily life. This is the contradiction between urgency and importance. Stimulating the emergence of new strategic ideas is the source of strong vitality for enterprises.

① Clarify the importance of strategic thinking, change the depressed mood of employees, change the spiritual outlook of the company, and communicate with superiors and subordinates. Generally speaking, enterprises should inject old management methods into new planning, and then pursue changes in old methods. Middle management plays a key role in the process of changing minds and should be paid special attention to.

② It is necessary to reward creative strategic thinking and overcome the phenomenon of guilty speakers. Those who have contributed to the company's strategic thinking should be rewarded; those who have made good suggestions but cannot implement them at the moment should do a good job and do not dampen their enthusiasm. Some company managers not only fail to nurture the seedlings of new strategic thinking, but are irritated by creative thinking, causing adverse effects. Therefore, when choosing a company manager, the attitude towards creative thinking or whether there is strategic thinking should be regarded as important conditions.

Generally speaking, it is to analyze the operating characteristics of the enterprise. To put it simply, it is to answer a question, that is, who are we? Many people think this question is very simple, but in fact it is not. When you work in an environment for a long time and are accustomed to the surroundings of the company, you may not be able to answer this question accurately. For example, for a certain automobile company, everyone can see that the business characteristics of this company are mainly manufacturing. However, after we analyzed the various business modules of the automobile company and its various business units, we found that the The biggest source of profits for automobile companies is not its manufacturing industry, but its financial industry. This is a very surprising analysis result. How should we understand such a result? Does it mean that the company can ignore its manufacturing industry and focus mainly on the development of its financial industry? Of course not. If this car company's financial industry is not based on manufacturing, it will lose its brand and goodwill, and will also lose its ability to make profits. Therefore, this automobile company must develop its manufacturing industry well, and it must be clear that its main source of profit is finance. Through this example, we can see that it is not easy for companies to recognize themselves.

In addition to analyzing your own situation, you must also analyze the macro environment and understand the changes that may occur now or in the future in various fields such as society, economy, politics, culture, and technology. On this basis, looking for market opportunities and identifying what obstacles will be encountered and what shortcomings will be encountered in seizing the market opportunities is the purpose of analyzing and predicting the strategic environment.

The goal referred to here is different from the "goal" in "determining strategic goals" we mentioned earlier. That "goal" is what we want to change, how to make the change, and what results we want to achieve, but Those descriptions are qualitative and not a quantitative goal. The strategic plan we formulate should be based on evaluable, measurable, and actionable plans. Quantitative goals are the basis for achieving this. For example, for an enterprise, how much market share should it achieve, how much sales should it achieve, how much profit should it achieve, how to control the time to achieve these goals, and when to achieve these goals, these are all important questions. Quantification of goals.

The comprehensive corporate strategy focuses on determining the corporate mission, dividing the business units, and determining the goals of key units. Like the automobile company mentioned earlier, it is necessary to determine the goals of its manufacturing units and the goals of its financial industry units in the comprehensive corporate strategy. This is the highest level strategy. For business strategy, its focus is on how to implement the corporate mission, environmental analysis, secondary unit goals, and the specific measures needed to achieve the goals. The sub-strategy is more detailed, focusing on how to implement and refine the goals. The refinement of goals includes development goals, quality goals, technological progress goals, market goals, employee quality goals, management improvement goals, efficiency goals, etc., as well as specific Measures; the last is tactics, which focus on dividing stages and formulating plans, analyzing risks that may be encountered at each stage, analyzing possible variables at each stage, and measures to deal with risks and variables.

For example: it is necessary to formulate an allocation plan for funds and other resources. After the plan is formulated, it is necessary to focus on funds; it is necessary to select measurement, review and control methods for the implementation process. The final step is to document the selected plan and submit it to the company's senior management for review and approval.

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Bank of America is the third largest bank in the United States. They choose Hoshin Kanri technology and Six Sigma to optimize business processes. Before reaching a consensus and formulating a unified plan, each bank department had its own set of process optimization solutions, but did not realize that they needed to communicate and integrate with other departments. Therefore, the new planning system ensured coordination within the bank organization, and the launch of Six Sigma also strengthened its core business and will continue to play a role in Bank of America for a long time to come.

Two of the main objectives of MEDRAD's strategic plan are to emphasize cooperation and responsibility. MEDRAD Corporation is a leading provider of medical devices and physician services that enable enhanced imaging procedures. MEDRAD is a leading medical device manufacturer that provides users with equipment and services in medical imaging technology. They use the performance management system to decompose the company's strategic goals in a waterfall style, that is, to correspond and connect corporate performance with individual performance. This waterfall-style decomposition process forces employees to have a high sense of responsibility and cooperation. At the same time, the company also allows employees to clearly understand the opportunities that will help them improve and grow. Among the 12 indicators of performance appraisal, cooperation spirit and coordination and balance ability are rated as the highest management level.

This is a lesson that Palmetto GBA, owner of South Carolina-based BlueCross BlueShield subsidiary, believes in most. Palmetto GBA firmly believes that not all employees still agree with the company's strategy as early as 1998. As a result, companies began to transform into evaluation management organizations, striving to create a strategy that drives the entire organization toward a common vision. They are developing plans in new collaborative ways across the company and are adding to employee performance metrics. The more employees involved in this new way of planning, the more executable the plan will be.

The Siemens medical project team firmly believes that "unanimity" is crucial, which will ensure that all members of the organization reach a consensus on goals and strategies. For example, when Siemens Services develops its business strategy, it achieves "unanimous buy-in" across all business lines - from business units to functional departments. After a process is formed, representatives from each region will sign a formal agreement, and this agreement will be implemented as a standard among their multinational organizations. Therefore, the agreement is a formal document of the company that will describe how a certain business is formed and the work and responsibilities necessary to achieve its intended goals.

The U.S. Postal Service has been described as "one of the best managed agents in government" by Government Executive Magazine, and the American Society for Quality has highlighted it as the best service department in all standardized industries. . For this, the Postal Service attributes this to certain key success factors in developing the strategy, such as continuity, communication and clarity. This means that their success is not won by "three minutes of enthusiasm", but the result of the persistence of strategic execution and gradual integration into corporate culture. In other words, the execution of this strategy will not change due to a change in corporate leadership. The Postal Service also continues to communicate with its 700,000 employees and millions of customers. Finally, it emphasizes strategic clarity, such as expressing the enterprise's ultimate goal clearly in digital form.

A physical examination of the brand is the first step in determining the success of brand strategic planning. This step is like tying the first button of our clothes. If the first button is tied incorrectly, the subsequent ones will also be tied incorrectly. Therefore, brand physical examination is a very rigorous and meticulous work. Even a small mistake will make you make a mistake and lose the overall situation.

The contents of the brand physical examination survey include: the market environment of the brand, the relationship between the brand and consumers, the relationship between the brand and competitive brands, the brand's assets, the brand's strategic goals, brand architecture, brand organization, etc.

From survey questionnaire design and quality control to statistical analysis and drawing conclusions, the brand physical examination lays the foundation for the next few steps of brand strategic planning.

For example, after 7 years of obscurity for the red canned beverage Wanglaoji, Chengmei Company conducted a detailed market survey and found that consumers especially want to prevent getting angry when eating. However, the cola, tea drinks, mineral water, juice, etc. currently on the market are obviously Since it did not have this function, it identified the brand appeal point of "preventing getting angry", which made Wong Lo Kat stand out and quickly became popular.

On the contrary, Coca-Cola also fell into the brand research trap. In 1982, Coca-Cola spent two years and millions of dollars on market research, and came to the wrong conclusion and changed the 100-year-old traditional formula. In the eyes of consumers, abandoning the traditional formula was tantamount to abandoning the American spirit. As a result, it received strong resistance and eventually had to use the original formula again.

Brand vision is like a beacon in the fog, pointing the way forward for the ship.

Simply put, brand vision is to tell consumers, shareholders and employees: What is the future development direction of the brand? What goals does the brand want to achieve in the future?

For example, Samsung's brand vision is to "become the leader in the digital convergence revolution"; Sony's brand vision is to "entertain all mankind - to become the leading brand of global entertainment electronic consumer products"; Hisense's brand vision is "China's Sony". These brand visions clearly convey the brand's future direction and goals.

So, how to develop a brand vision? We should seriously consider these questions:

The core value of the brand is the soul and essence of the brand, and is the center around which all marketing communication activities of the company revolve.

Refining the core value of a brand should follow the following principles:

After the core value of the brand is determined, the brand constitution should be formulated around the core value of the brand to make it operable.

The brand constitution is the law that governs all marketing and communication activities of an enterprise. It makes all marketing and communication activities of an enterprise have laws and regulations to follow.

The brand constitution consists of the brand strategic architecture and the brand identity system.

The brand strategic architecture mainly determines the following issues:

Brand strategic architecture is a major matter related to the development of an enterprise. Whether the strategic architecture decision is correct or not will lead to the gain and loss of hundreds of millions of assets of the enterprise, and even the fate of the enterprise. For example: Nestlé once launched "Giaolan" mineral water, but the investment was huge and the results were little. In 2001, it switched to "Nestle" as the brand of mineral water. As a result, the product quickly occupied the market without much investment in advertising. If Nestlé had not taken timely and decisive measures, hundreds of millions of dollars would have been wasted.

The brand identification system includes: the brand's product identification, concept identification, visual identification, temperament identification, behavior identification, responsibility identification, etc. In these identification systems, a brand's corporate philosophy, culture, values, and mission are specifically defined and standardized. Product quality, features, usage, grade, brand's product packaging, VI system, film and television advertisements, posters, brand's temperament and characteristics, brand's position in the same industry, brand's corporate social responsibility, brand's corporate behavior system, employee behavior system etc.

These brand identification systems specifically define the standards and directions of corporate marketing communication activities, making the abstract concept of brand core value effectively and operationally connected with corporate daily activities. Break down the literal aspects of brand strategy into product research and development, production, quality, features, channels, advertising, promotion, service, etc., and even the behavior of each employee.

For example: McDonald's hamburger patties are very particular about their ingredients and must be made of 83% shoulder meat and 17% pork belly, which reflects the identity of its product features; the price of a Parker pen of 1,000 yuan reflects its product grade identity. ;The romantic and elegant plot of Changyu dry red commercial reflects its temperament recognition and so on.

At present, many enterprises in our country attach great importance to brand management, but the organizational structure of brand management is not scientific. Many corporate brand managers are set up in the marketing department, which is equivalent to a general advertising manager. Their role is only advertising, visual design, etc., and they have not yet played a role in brand strategic management.

In a true brand management company like Procter & Gamble, the brand manager is almost the "little general manager" of a certain brand. They are responsible for solving all problems related to the brand, and mobilize all the company's resources through communication and persuasion to serve the brand building. This positioning makes them the true owners of the brand.

Of course, there is no one-size-fits-all rule for setting up a brand management organization, and it is not advisable to just copy "Procter & Gamble's" approach. Companies should consider their own circumstances.

For companies with strong strength and many brands, they can learn from P&G's experience. For example, Shanghai Jahwa has achieved success in implementing the brand manager system.

For most other companies with brand as their core competitiveness, it is recommended to establish a brand management organization headed by a company vice president who is proficient in branding, with the marketing department or public relations planning department mainly responsible, and other departments participating, so as to effectively organize and mobilize the resources of various departments of the company. For brand building services. Brand management organizations should have product development and manufacturing rights, market cost control rights, product price setting rights, etc., so as to grasp the general direction of brand development.

Once the brand strategy is determined, all-round and multi-angle brand communication and promotion should be carried out to make the brand deeply rooted in the hearts of the people.

There is no static model for brand communication and promotion. Melatonin's advertising bombing stands out, while Starbucks' advertising-free operation is still outstanding. Enterprises should formulate corresponding communication and promotion strategies based on their own conditions.

Brand communication and promotion should adhere to the following principles:

A strong brand is not built by creativity, but by "persistence".

Once the core value of the brand is determined, all marketing and communication activities of the company should be done with determination and perseverance to maintain it. This has become the secret to creating a century-old golden license plate for a first-class international brand.

Horizontal persistence: During the same period, product packaging, advertising, public relations, market vividness, etc. should all focus on the same theme and image.

Vertical persistence: 1 year, 2 years, 10 years...different expression themes of the brand in different periods should focus on the same brand core value.

All powerful and powerful brands have consistently adhered to their brand promises to consumers for decades. Coca-Cola's interpretation of "optimism" has not changed for a hundred years, Geely's interpretation of "men's choice" for 100 years, Lux has conveyed the image of "nourishing and noble" for 70 years, Marlboro has expressed "masculinity and boldness" for 50 years, and the diamond advertising slogan "Diamonds are forever" "Far and away, a heart will last forever" has been circulating for 60 years...

On the other hand, many domestic brands (even well-known brands) have unclear brand core value positioning, and the theme of advertising appeals changes day by day. It has become Xintianyou. "Change the leader, change the logo", "change the advertising company, change the brand positioning", despite the investment in brand building Huge, but brand equity has not been effectively enhanced.

When a brand develops to a certain stage and launches new products, whether to use the original brand or launch a new brand, the card of brand extension should be played.

In an increasingly competitive market, completely building a new brand will consume huge manpower, material resources, and financial resources. According to statistics, the failure rate of new brands is as high as 80%. It takes 35-50 million US dollars to develop a new brand in the United States, and Brand extension only costs US$500,000, which can be regarded as a "green channel" to quickly capture the market. After Nestlé's brand extension, its products expanded to coffee, baby milk powder, condensed milk, ice cream, lemon tea, etc. As a result, each product sold well. Robust's sales before the brand extension were only more than 400 million yuan, and after the extension, it was less than 3 It reached nearly 2 billion yuan per year.

However, brand extension is a double-edged sword. It can be an accelerator for corporate development, or it can be a waterloo for corporate development. Therefore, brand extension should be decided carefully and the principles of brand extension must be followed:

The focus of strategic planning is to make optimal strategic decisions, while the focus of strategic management is to focus on generating new strategic results - new markets, new products and new technologies; strategic planning is developed by a specialized department, while strategic management involves all organizations department, it is more comprehensive and extends strategy to all organizational units; strategic management includes strategic planning, but it is more concerned with the execution of strategy and the integration of organizational strengths to achieve strategic goals, and the formulation of plans or plans is no longer a special departmental activities, but the responsibility of all managers. In short, the two concepts of strategic planning and strategic management are complementary to each other: strategic management is richer in content than strategic planning, and at the same time, strategic planning is an indispensable element of the strategic management of every organization.

Strategic planning was originally applied and developed in the private sector. Its purpose is to improve the organization's ability to think and act from a strategic perspective. Its potential advantages in the strategic management process are huge. As a new research approach or a link in the strategic management process, strategic planning plays an important role in the public sector (strategic) management process.

(1) Help public sector leaders and managers address the challenges they face now and in the coming years;

(2) Respond to increasingly uncertain and interconnected environmental factors external to the organization;

(3) Seek ways to implement superior orders and complete missions;

(4) Construct strategic issues that the public sector must explain. Through SWOT analysis, the public sector can clearly describe the issues it must face;

(5) Find ways to explain these issues by reviewing the organizational mandate and mission, the level of products and services provided by the organization, and cost and financial management methods.