Strategic SnapShots Part 3 - Performance Scoring

Strategic SnapShots©: What REALLY matters? Part 3: Performance Scoring

Recap of Part 1

The first stage in the process as described in Part 1 is to:

  • formulate a Focus Question,
  • brainstorm the answers to the Focus Question,
  • each delegate privately develops seven Critical Factors, and then
  • collaboratively synthesize seven composite factors that include all inputs from all
  • Summarize these factors into concise, positive headings which are carried forward in the rest of the analysis. This process by design extracts those factors that are most important, and which relate to the essence of the business.

 

Recap of Part 2 – Weighting

The second stage in the process as described in Part 2 is for delegates to privately allocate relative weights to the seven critical factors and then discuss the different views of the mountain and agree one way up the mountain (one set of weights).  This again nets down the focus to the most important elements, the essence of the business context being analysed, a 20:80 (Pareto) approach.

This process can be undertaken in-house using a spreadsheet or you can purchase our set of reasonably sophisticated spreadsheets and training videos to aid with the process or you can contract us to facilitate for you.

Part 3 – Performance Scoring

The next step is to score historic, current, forecast and objective performance.

This is done on a scale of 0 to 10 where 0 = “could not be worse anywhere in the world” and 10 = ”could not be better anywhere in the world”.  Reference is again made to mountains, Everest = 10 and a bowling green by the sea shore = 0.  The absolute scoring highlights different paradigms around the table and a conversation is again facilitated with a view to achieving a common view of the situation.

By scoring historic, current and forecast where forecast is “where we will be in n months / years if we continue doing what we have currently planned without new action” we generate a graphical view of the health of the organization.  Note that for short term tactical analysis, such as responding to the current Pandemic n might be three or six months whereas for long term strategic planning it might be 3, 5 or 10 years.

If the resulting strategic trajectory is level we see an organization that is surviving, if it is down the organization is dying and if it is up the organization is at some level thriving.

Strategic Trajectory

The objective score tells us where the team desire the organization to be.  The gap between the forecast and the objective points to new action required in order to achieve the strategic objective.

We then analyse the gap across the seven critical factors with the weights applied to the scores thereby obtaining a measure of what really requires maximum attention.

 

Weighted Scores with Critical Gaps

Here again we are netting down to the MOST critical gaps which, once remediated will have the greatest beneficial impact on the organization – again we are focusing on the strategic essence.

This completes the Strategic SnapShot© process.  We then move on to the Strategic Gap Analysis, which we call StratGap©.

In my next article …

In my next article we will look at the Strategic Gap Analysis – developing no more than seven weighted and scored projects and plan actions to close each of the gaps revealed by the Strategic SnapShot©.

Thereafter we move on to the Strategic Map, the Strategic Action plan and other elements of a comprehensive planning process.  See my free webinar below for a detailed discussion of the entire process with examples.

Experience my Strategic SnapShot© workshop for yourself

If you would like to experience my process, I am offering High-Impact-Low-Cost StratSnap© workshops focused on making decisions today. These workshops draw on my military experience in the Quick Attack where a unit has only a few hours to assess available intelligence before advancing on a target, and where bad decisions get people killed. If you and your team have a key decision to make, see our workshop options and pricing here.

View my video series, “Strategy: What IS it? HOW to develop actionable plans”

Get my free 80-minute hour 3-part video series. In these videos I take you through my method and tool as a benchmark of what I consider to be best practice.  There is a six-minute Executive Summary if you do not have time for the full three-part Webinar.

The tool and training videos are available for purchase on the links below the videos.