Strategic Planning in a Recovering Market (2 of 3)

Last week, I shared some of the insights from a NIWeek 2010 Alliance Day presentation given by Don Roberts, Exotek. He is a principal of a consulting and operations-support company focused solely on the systems integrator. Continuing on, Don suggested some tools to assist in your strategic planning process.

Strategy maps put into focus the often-blurry line of sight between your corporate strategy and what your employees do every day

                                                – Kaplan and Norton

Strategic Maps and Balanced Scorecards

Strategic maps help communicate your corporate strategy. And, balanced scorecards are a way to measure your strategic progress. They typically focus your company strategy around the following areas:

• Financial Perspective – How do you look against the financial objectives of the company’s owners
• Customer Perspective – How do you look to your current and prospective customers?
• Internal Business Perspective – What must you excel run an effective business?
• Learning Perspective – What must you organization learn to improve your business?

These perspectives then help to layout both your strategic map and balanced scorecard. There are more details, then I could effectively cover in this blog, but there are lots of useful information available on-line. Don offered an example for an Alliance Partner.