In my last post I identified 4 key phases to successful planning and we looked in detail at phase 1- preparation. I can’t emphasise enough how important the preparation stage is to ensure your plan has impact.
So as a club once you have identified your goals for your plan, you have your initial team in place and you know where you currently stand in relation to your end goal or vision you need to move to the planning phase.
Your next task is to create a detailed plan. Given that you know where you are and where you need to be you just need to plan how you are going to get there.
Quite simply if you take the four questions below for each of your goals you won’t go far wrong:
- What – do we need to do?
- How – are we going to do this?
- Who – is going to do this?
- When – is each phase going to happen and when will we complete the plan?
The detail in your plan is important. I recommend the plan is broken down into a number of small achievable goals, rather than one large goal. These goals should be in line with the way you have defined success. Each aspect of the plan can then have detail assigned.
The team you have assembled should now have input, but remembering the old adage, “too many cooks….” they can’t all write the plan. I suggest you allocate key aspects of the plan to an “owner”, who will chair discussions and pull together their proposal for final agreement by the committee. As an example if your plan involves the growth of your junior academy then that part of the plan should be owned by the current junior chairman or equivalent. If it’s to do with financial security then the Treasurer should own that part of the plan.
To keep on top of this planning phase you will need to work to strict deadlines for owners to submit their part of the plan.
Once all the plans are received a small group should consolidate them into one master plan. This document should prioritise the project, calculate a budget and schedule, and determine what resources are needed (including who needs to be involved).
Now that the plan is in place it can be circulated to the relevant parties and a precis of the plan publicised to club members (via your website, newsletter etc) so that all are aware of the actions and activity that will be taking place and ultimately what the end goal is for the club.
This then leads into the Implementation phase which will be discussed in part 3.
If winning isn't everything why keep score? 
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