Why strategic planning? Strategic planning is a collective process that provides guidelines for a group to discuss, deliberate, and agree upon decisions and actions that shape how your organization can best accomplish its goals. Through strategic planning, an organization develops a mutually-agreed upon understanding of what the organization is, what it does, and why it does what it does.  Most importantly, strategic planning is a learning process for the board, staff, and key stakeholders of an organization.

Organizations, government departments, institutions—all can benefit from having a strategic plan. There’s a variety of ways to do strategic planning, and numerous organizational development consultants in Dane County who can work with your organization and governance board on strategic planning. Working with an Extension educator is unique in that we prioritize your engagement in designing and implementing the process. When you work with an Extension educator on strategic planning, you’ll also learn assessment and process tools and strategies. We don’t do the work for you, we work with you in an adventure of discovery!

Dane County Community Development educators support a limited number of organizations each year with strategic planning, and we prioritize early-stage or low-budget organizations. We work with your organization to identify which components of strategic planning (organizational assessment; needs assessment; mission, vision, values development; strategy identification and development; action planning, monitoring and evaluation) your organization will focus on. We draw from a variety of process techniques to develop a planning process that suits your organization.

To discuss your strategic planning needs, please contact: