Definitions
To implement a strategic planning process it is necessary to take into account the following basic definitions:
Vision: It is the statement that indicates where the unit is heading in the long term, indicates the position that is expected to be reached in the future. Navas and Guerras (1998) point out that vision is also the "strategic purpose".
Mission: Represents the identity of the organization, at the present time and facing the future. You must answer the following question: What is the reason for our organization? The mission can be rethought as a consequence of changes in the environment or manifest difficulties in making it effective.
Values: They are the ethical experiential references that each member of the university community must possess internalized in their actions. They obey internal criteria and not external pressure to be accepted.
Policies: They are the guide to guide decision-making by the authorities, which establish the possibilities and limits in which actions must be carried out; They are formulated at the senior management level and must be explicit so that they are known and disseminated throughout the organization.
Environment analysis: It is the diagnosis of threats and opportunities that the external environment of the organization offers to its strategic development.
Internal analysis: It is the diagnosis that allows identifying the strengths and weaknesses of the organization to develop its competitive performance.
Objectives: It is the description of the specific purposes of the plan and responds to what it is intended to achieve in the different dimensions of the development of the organization, they are located within the general frame of reference given by the Vision and the Mission.
Goals: It is a quantitative expression of the concrete achievements that must be obtained to achieve the expected results with the objective that has been proposed.
Strategies: It is a general sequence of actions to be implemented to achieve a given set of objectives, it should help prioritize and allocate the organization's resources. A strategy must be able to anticipate possible reactions from the competition.
Programs: It is the organic set of projects and operations that applied to the initial situation will alter its situation in the direction of the institutional vision.
Plans: They are the set of programs where reference is made to general decisions that express: guidelines, priorities, action strategies, resource allocation and a set of means to be used to achieve proposed goals and objectives.
Projects: It is a proposal of activities organized around a specific objective, to be carried out in a certain period of time.
Resource allocation: This is the budgetary expression of the plan where cost estimates are made and resources are requested from different sources of financing.
Control: Process through which what is achieved is evaluated in relation to what is expected to ensure the achievement of the objectives according to the plan.
Evaluation: Corresponds to a permanent process of information and reflection, which consists of selecting information related to the performance and achievement of objectives in order to make value judgments oriented to decision-making.
Planning process
The strategic planning process begins with the definition of the Vision, Mission and Values, thereby defining the strategic orientation of the organization: Where do you want to go? What is your reason for being? What are the values that inspire the organization to achieve the Vision and fulfill its Mission? Along with these guidelines, the organization's policies that will establish the referential framework of its actions must be made explicit.
In a second instance, it is necessary to carry out a diagnosis external to the organization and another of an internal nature, in order to identify the conditions of the environment in which it operates and the potentialities and limitations that exist in the organization to meet the requirements of that medium.
From the diagnosis, the organization sets its objectives and goals to face the challenges of the environment and overcome the limitations, the objectives must be achievable, realistic, measurable and consistent with the Vision and Mission of the organization; on the other hand, the goals must be a quantitative expression of the expected results when achieving the proposed objectives.
Once the objectives are known, it is necessary to establish the ways to achieve them, for this the most convenient strategies are proposed in accordance with the organizational Mission and in the referential framework given by the Policies.
The strategies are embodied in a set of activities and initiatives that are expressed in plans, programs and projects, which will demand resources that must be allocated according to the priorities established by the organization's policies. At this stage the strategic plan is implemented.
The implementation of the plan must be controlled to verify deviations between what is expected and what has been achieved, and evaluated to obtain learning that allows improving the organization's performance in order to fulfill its Mission and achieve its Vision.
This process can be observed graphically in figure 1:
Source: Own elaboration from the bibliography consulted
Bibliography
Cairo, Javier (s / f). Strategic planning. Available at http://www.gestiopolis.com/teoria-de-la-planificacion-estrategica/
CHILE, Ministry of Planning and Cooperation (1995). Methodological Notes for the elaboration of Regional Strategies and Plans. National PADERE Program (MIDEPLAN / UNDP Agreement). Santiago de Chile.
ECOL (2006). Strategic Direction. Postgraduate Training Notes. Continuous online education for professionals. Available in
Navas, J. and Guerras, L. (1998) The Strategic Direction of the Company Theory and Applications. Civitas Economy and Business Library. Civitas Ediciones, Madrid.
