Strategic Planning Glossary
Index
- Budget.
- A plan in numbers.
- Benchmarking.
- A process of comparing organizational performance against other, similar operations or jurisdictions, or against a standard, past time-frame, while maintaining direct comparability of performance measures.
- Change verbs.
- Action words that tend to describe how things become different. Change verbs (see examples) are useful in writing mission statements, goals, and strategic objectives.
- Goal.
- A written statement describing the direction that indicates success or improvement in organizational performance. See also Values.
- Horizon; also planning horizon.
- The farthest date that the strategic plan addresses; the target date by which the organization expects to accomplish its intended outcomes.
- Mission statement.
- The broadest possible statement of the organization's purposes, goals, values and functions. It describes the underlying design, aim or thrust of an organization. It contains the basic purpose or philosophy of the organization.
- Needs assessment.
- A process for scanning the environment, examining opportunities and threats to the organization. In the private sector, Needs Assessment includes Market Research analyses.
- Objective.
- A written statement describing an intended outcome, output or process, depending on type: strategic objectives describe intended outcomes or results; tactical objectives describe intended outputs or products; operational objectives describe intended processes or procedures.
- Operating budget.
- Tactical resource requirements, plus tactical priorities, equal operating budget.
- Opportunities and Threats.
- Factors which contribute to the success or failure of achieving the organization's mission, and which are outside of the organization's direct control.
- Outcome measure.
- A performance measure that quantifies the extent to which results are achieved, and that measures effectiveness. See strategic performance measure.
- Output measure.
- A performance measure that quantifies how much "product" is produced, and that measures efficiency. See tactical performance measure.
- Performance feed forward (feedback).
- A systematic procedure for comparing actual performance to planned performance, and using that information in subsequent planning cycles.
- Performance measure.
- A yardstick or standard used to measure progress toward achieving a strategic objective or a tactical objective. It is a measure of how well we are doing. See also: strategic performance measure, outcome measure, tactical performance measure, and output measure.
- Plan.
- A budget in words.
- Planning horizon.
- See horizon.
- Productivity measure.
- A performance measure that quantifies how much "product" is produced at what cost, and that measures economy. See tactical performance measure.
- Resource requirements.
- A quantitative description (usually in money) of the capital, equipment, information, labor and land that achievement of a tactical objective will require.
- Stakeholders.
- Those people, institutions and interests which have an interest in, or contribute to, the organization's success or failure in achieving its mission.
- Strategic objective.
- A written statement describing an intended outcome; a results-oriented objective.
- Strategic performance measure.
- A yardstick or standard used to measure progress toward achieving a strategic objective. a measure of how well we are doing; an outcome measure.
- Strategic planning.
- A continuous process where people make decisions about intended future outcomes, how outcomes are to be accomplished, and how success is measured and evaluated.
- Strategic priorities.
- A ranking of an organization's strategic objectives by importance; a description of what an organization's decision-makers believe is more important or less important; a basis (criterion) for evaluating the tactical planning and budget-setting process.
- Strategy.
- An approach, or an implementation methodology, that will lead to achieving a strategic objective.
- Strengths and weaknesses.
- Aspects which are under the organization's direct control. Tactical planning makes full use of the organization's internal strengths, avoids the weaknesses, and addresses ways to overcome the weaknesses.
- Tactical objective.
- A written statement describing an intended output; a product-oriented or productivity-oriented objective. A tactical objective describes how a strategic objective will be accomoplished. A tactical objective describes products that will contribute to achieving a strategic objective.
- Tactical performance measure.
- A yardstick or standard used to measure progress toward achieving a tactical objective; a measure of how well we are doing; an output measure or a productivity measure.
- Tactical planning.
- A continuous process where people make decisons about how outcomes are to be accomplished, what products will be produced, how success is measured and evaluated, and how budgetary resources are allocated.
- Tactical priorities.
- A ranking of an organization's tactical objectives by importance; descriptions of which of an organization's products its decision-makers believe are more important or less important in achieving the organization's mission; a basis for determining the organization's operating budget.
- Value.
- A written statement describing the direction that indicates success or improvement in internal organizational characteristics, or in the expression of beliefs the organization holds. Values may be similar to goals, but they usually relate to internal characteristics of the organization, rather than to external organizational performance.