We all hove done strategic planning. Now it’s time to try strategic doing.
Ed Morrison is founder of the Purdue Agile Strategy Lab. A one-time economic development consultant, like many of us one day Ed found himself in a public policy strategic planning exercise thinking There’s Gotta Be A Better Way. He talked to a lot of other people who cared a lot about all sorts of different public and private action, and a core group of practitioners and teachers started working on that better way.
This book is the result. Based on case studies steeped in theory, without coming across as a text book, Strategic Doing is about getting things done. Too often I’ve stared at the plans on my shelves, and wondered why they sit there gathering dust. Now I have some ideas how to focus my plans on implementation—strategic doing is one way to put good planning to work.
Strategic Doing: Ten Skills for Agile Leadership, by E. Morrison, S. Hutcheson, E. Nilsen, J. Fadden & N. Franklin, 2019.
- Create and Maintain a Safe Space for Deep, Focused Conversation
- Frame the Conversation with the Right Question
- Identify Your Assets, Including the Hidden Ones
- Link and Leverage Assets to identify New Opportunities
- Look for the “Big Easy”
- Convert Your Ideas to Outcomes with Measurable Characteristics
- Start Slowly to Go Fast—But Start
- Draft Short-Term Action Plans That Include Everyone
- Set 30/30 Meetings to Review, Learn, and Adjust
- Nudge, Connect, and Promote to Reinforce New Habits
This book review (minus Ed’s video) originally published in the APA Small Town & Rural Planning newsletter Summer 2019, and was briefly trending #StrategicPlanning on LinkedIn. I first wrote about #StrategicDoing back in 2015.
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The Economist