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6 Elements of Effective Strategic Planning

While the business operations framework is a continuous cycle in which each stage informs the next,
developing a strategic plan is the best place to start.

During the strategic planning process, an organization performs three steps:

1. Builds or modifies the foundational strategic vision and mission


2. Commits to goals that drive overall health
3. Develops a long-term plan to achieve the goals

This is the second in a 5-part blog series defining The Spur Group’s unique perspective on the often
overlooked, but incredibly valuable world of business operations. 

A strong strategic plan positions the organization for success and clearly defines it at every level.

A common mistake we see businesses make is starting tactical initiative execution without first
communicating and aligning on the goal. Skipping these important steps can leave your organization
without direction.

Read ahead to learn more about the six vital elements of strategic
planning: vision, mission, objectives, strategy, approach, and tactics. 

 
1.     Define your vision

An organization’s vision statement is an aspirational description of what it wants to achieve in the


future.

A vision statement serves as a clear guide for choosing current and future courses of action — a definition
of where you want your organization to be in the long term. It sets the tone and provides a North Star on
the horizon.

One example of a company with a strong vision statement is Warby Parker, the online prescription
glasses retailer founded in 2010 that is now worth an estimated $3 billion.

Warby Parker’s vision statement has two parts: “We believe that buying glasses should be easy and fun. It
should leave you happy and good-looking, with money in your pocket. We also believe that everyone has
a right to see.”

With just three sentences, the vision statement tells you exactly what the company aims to achieve.
Namely, to make the process for buying prescription glasses and sunglasses fun and straightforward
(unlike the traditional method). The vision also aims for customers to have fashionable frames, but at a
lower cost than existing options.

The last sentence of the vision statement adds in a purpose statement (aka why the company exists): “We
also believe that everyone has a right to see.” Since the beginning, Warby Parker has touted its “Buy a
Pair, Give a Pair” program that donates glasses to people who can’t otherwise afford them. According to
the CEO, this purpose is what motivates employees to join and stay with the company. Not all leaders
include a social impact focus in their company’s vision and purpose statement, but it’s becoming
increasingly popular with the growing buying power of Millennial and Gen Z consumers.

A powerful vision statement helps company employees focus their work in the right direction — and a
strong vision statement will do the same for your organization.

2.     Create your mission


While your vision is an organization-wide goal, your mission how you plan to achieve the vision.

Without a mission, your organization lacks the why and how. If everyone in your organization has their
own interpretation of the vision, it can lead to conflicting strategies and initiatives.

For Warby Parker, there are many possible routes to achieve the company vision that states “buying
glasses should be easy and fun. It should leave you happy and good-looking, with money in your pocket.”

The company’s mission statement is: “By circumventing traditional channels, designing glasses in-house,
and engaging with customers directly, we’re able to provide higher-quality, better-looking prescription
eyewear at a fraction of the going price.”

After the founding team realized early on that one large company dominated the eyewear industry with
inflated prices, they decided to find a way to lower prices and increase quality, while also turning a profit.
The resulting actions included bringing many traditionally outsourced services in-house, such as design
and consumer marketing/sales.
3.     Set your objectives
Objectives are specific results that a person or system aims to achieve within a time frame.

Defining success early lets you know if you are on the path to achieve your mission and vision. Clearly
articulating your objectives creates goal posts by which your organization can measure its overall health
and the impact of strategic initiatives.

In general, good objectives should be clear, measurable and be supported by multiple strategic initiatives
across the organization.

While Warby Parker isn’t a public company and is not legally required to release annual financial
statements, the organization does voluntary release an annual impact report. The report provides a
window into the company’s strategic objectives with the inclusion of priority issues relevant to both
stakeholders and the company. For the most recent 2019 report, the top issues cited are the Buy a Pair,
Give a Pair program, customer experience, innovation, product safety, and responsible sourcing.

For the Buy a Pair, Give a Pair program, Warby Parker’s relevant objective might be aimed at growing
the program, while the innovation priority may be tied to the objective of innovating to meet the strategic
vision and mission. The issue of responsible sourcing could lead to an objective of using all recycled
packaging or becoming carbon neutral. While the listed issues are presented through an impact lens, they
also have a financial purpose.

4.    Develop your strategy


Your strategy is a long-term plan that enables you to achieve your organization’s objectives.

An effective strategy brings together vision and execution. Strategies are much more specific than an
organization’s vision, mission, and objectives. They are typically only shared within an organization and
ideally built around an organization’s needs and market context. Strategies should map long-term plans to
objectives and actionable steps, foster innovative thinking, as well as anticipate and mitigate potential
pitfalls.

Strategic plans often look out 3-5 years, and there may be a separate plan for each individual objective
within the organization. In the Warby Parker annual impact report, we have insight into the strategy for
each of the objectives identified above. We’ll highlight potential strategies for two areas: the Buy a Pair,
Give a Pair program and innovation.

By the end of 2019 Warby Parker had distributed seven million pairs of glasses to 23 countries through
the Buy a Pair, Give a Pair Program and will be likely focus on expanding those numbers in 2021 and
beyond. According to the impact report, 2.5 billion people around the world lack access to affordable
glasses to learn and work. In order to make a positive impact, Warby Parker needed to develop strategies
to continue chipping away at that need, as well as meet company objectives, mission and vision. An
example strategy for this program could be expanding the US-based Pupils Project, which gives school
children access to free vision services and glasses. In the 2019-2020 school year, Warby Parker expanded
the program from New York City and Baltimore to Philadelphia, providing vision services to an
estimated 25,000 students in the School District of Philadelphia.

In addition, Warby Parker has traditionally been focused on eyewear and reimagining the customer
experience for glasses wearers, so naturally the company’s leadership identified an innovation
opportunity to add daily contact lenses in November 2019, which was likely the result of a multi-year
strategic plan. Like Warby Parker’s eyeglasses process, the company allows a trial period for contact
wearers, who can request 6 days of contacts in their prescription before committing to a full 90-day
supply.

5.     Outline your approach


An approach provides a methodology for executing your strategy.

The approach is a framework for answering key questions that will later determine tactics. Plus, it guides
an organization on how to execute the strategic plan.

Within our Warby Parker example, each strategic plan included an approach that guided the leadership
team in their analysis and plan execution. While we won’t cover each decision the company made in
2019, we’d like to focus on two big ones: the Pupils Project expansion and the launch of the contact lens
brand Scout.

When it came to expanding the Pupils Project, the Warby Parker leadership team needed an approach for
addressing each key decision for the program. There were likely more decisions than we can cover in one
whitepaper, but will focus on two: whether to partner with existing non-profits or create its own program
and how to make the greatest impact with the funds available.

Leading up to the decision points, like whether to expand the Pupils Program to Philadelphia, the
leadership’s approach probably included a consideration of whether to develop the program infrastructure
and manage it internally or partner with existing non-profits. The approach also likely included a cost-
benefit analysis of that question, evaluating the financial ROI and social impact of each option. The
company ultimately choose to work with two local Philadelphia nonprofits.

Another key decision requiring a strong approach within the Pupils Program was how to have the greatest
impact with the funds available. The company needed an approach that would help them answer and
inform key decisions. Those decisions could have included an analysis of whether to contribute the
glasses directly or make a cash equivalent donation to the nonprofits, how to identify schools for the
project (for example considering the greatest overall need or the number of glasses Warby Parker can
provide), as well as who should manage the logistics of the screenings and eyeglasses deliveries.

On the innovation side, Warby Parker needed a quality approach to ensure the contact lens brand launch
(called Scout) was aligned with the existing mission, vision, objectives and strategies. In order to create a
contact lens that was high quality, affordable, and with lower waste packaging, the company needed a
multi-pronged approach. Two crucial areas of planning for the Scout contact lenses were undoubtedly the
design of the product and choosing the right manufacturer.

Because contact lenses were completely new to the company, Warby Parker needed to either design them
in house or hire an outside design team that would meet the high standards the leadership outlined in
the 2019 impact report, “On top of creating a great shopping experience for our customers, we have high
expectations for what a daily contact lens should be—high quality, moist, breathable, comfortable,
innovative, and affordable. It’s a lot to ask of one product, but we were relentless in our search for a
contact lens that checked all of those boxes.”

While the company does not say in the report which route it chose for design, the leadership likely did a
cost benefit analysis of designing it in-house vs. working with an outside design company or freelance
designers. The key considerations were likely the cost to design, the strategic importance of certain
attributes (like breathability, moisture content, shape), the cost to manufacture, and the sustainability
considerations.

In terms of the approach to find the right manufacturer, Warby Parker needed to find a partner that met
the company’s quality, cost, and environmental standards. The sustainability standards included finding
packaging with significant less waste and incorporating recycled materials from the manufacturing
process. The company’s approach to finding a manufacturer probably included research and a ranking of
multiple companies with the above criteria in mind, then doing a comparison across the top choices and
additional due diligence before choosing a partner.

Through these examples, you can see how an approach ladders up to strategies, outcomes and eventually
the company’s mission.

6.    Get down to tactics


Tactics are focused initiatives, projects, or programs that allow organizations to execute a strategic
plan.

Tactics are the key to execution. They are the actions you take to make it all happen.

Within each decision Warby Parker made, the company used different tactics to move it from an idea to
actual product or program. While each decision could have dozens of tactics, we’ve highlighted one or
two examples for each.

For the Pupils Project at Warby Parker, the decision for how to have the largest impact possible required
several tactics or initiatives to make that happen. The company choose to have the nonprofit partners run
the screenings while Warby Parker provided the glasses and had the students choose their styles from 40
options in a truck show. One necessary tactic was bringing together the design and logistics teams to
narrow down the style options that would be appealing to kids, cost effective, and easy to produce in large
numbers.

Another important tactic was likely determining how to produce and deliver the glasses to the students,
whether the glasses should deliver to their homes or the schools, and how to ensure the glasses fit
correctly after they arrived. The Pupils Project’s overall goal is for children to have glasses to enable their
ability to learn, and in order to do that, they need to actually use the glasses for the long-term, so it’s
important to have styles that appeal to children, as well as well-fitting frames.

In terms of tactics for the Scout contact lens launch, once the company made the decision on a design
team, the project leaders determined tactics to make the contacts idea a reality. The designers had specific
research guidelines to find material and construction that fit the criteria of “high quality, moist,
breathable, comfortable, innovative, and affordable.” The final product is made with a material that resists
drying and constructed using new technology to increase eye comfort during wear.

The company design team also created flat pack packaging that is more hygienic, uses less raw materials,
and takes up less space compared to traditional contact lens packaging. Even the placement of the contact
(upside down) was intentional to reduce the chance of contamination from dirt or bacteria when the
wearer puts them in their eye. Each of these items were likely framed as tactics and initiatives used to
create the Scout lenses. Each was directly related to Warby Parker’s approach to the decision, the overall
strategy, and aligned with the larger mission and vision.
On the surface, each tactic might not seem connected, but as you dig deeper, you’ll find that effective
tactics should always tie back to the strategy, objectives, mission, and vision of the company.

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