Changing the Way the World Thinks about Strategy

Simplified Strategic Planning Manual and Templates

Thousands of leaders are reaping the benefits of Simplified Strategic Planning, a proven process for charting your course and direction that focuses your resources for sustainable competitive advantage and superior performance in any business environment.

If you and your management team follow the process in this clear and concise manual, you will:

  • complete a fully documented strategic plan, with supporting data and decision criteria.
  • develop a competitive strategy to beat or (better yet) avoid competition.
  • identify and resolve your key strategic issues.
  • clearly assign responsibility for action plan implementation.
  • sharply focus your efforts on what is most important to your future success.
  • improve tomorrow’s results through efficient and effective strategic management.
  • take control of your destiny by establishing a lean, effective strategy process that fits your business.
  • reach and stretch for higher levels of attainment.
  • deal with rapidly changing developments that will confront your business in the coming years.
  • translate the company vision into personal involvement and alignment for your employees.
  • generate motivation enthusiasm and commitment.
  • achieve your highest potential.
  • accomplish all of this without interfering with the daily conduct of your business.

The SIMPLIFIED STRATEGIC PLANNING manual contains clear and complete instructions, exhibits and illustrated example worksheets. All worksheet templates are available at no extra cost. This manual will lead you through the effective and efficient SIMPLIFIED STRATEGIC PLANNING process in the following steps.

  1. Development and examination of the necessary external and internal information required for planning your strategy.
  2. Identification and evaluation of strengths, weaknesses, and strategic competencies which are critical to your future success.
  3. Examination of necessary assumptions concerning probable future developments which would have a significant impact on your business and over which you have no control and no certain knowledge.
  4. Identification and evaluation of your threats and opportunities.
  5. Strategic assessment of your present and potential market segments.
  6. Selection of market and competitive strategies for your core business.
  7. Selection of appropriate development strategies.
  8. Determination and definition of the desired role of the business.
  9. Development of guiding principles for the successful conduct of the business.
  10. Establishment of realistic, specific objectives to support your strategies, desired role and guiding principles.
  11. Development of action plans which will translate your objectives into results.
  12. Provision of necessary resources (time and money) within availability constraints for the achievement of those results.
  13. Scheduled reviews of situational developments, progress and performance on a timely basis.

Table of Contents

Section 1: EXTERNAL SITUATION
  • Market Segment Analysis
  • Competitive Evaluations
  • Technology Assessment
  • Supplier Market Assessments
  • Current Economic Situation
  • Significant Regulations
Section 2: INTERNAL SITUATION
  • Balance Sheet
  • Five Year Operating Statement
  • Measures of Success
  • Profitability Analysis
Section 3: CAPABILITIES AND COMPETENCIES
  • Capabilities Assessments
  • Strategic Competencies
Section 4: ASSUMPTIONS
  • Assumptions for Market Segments
  • Competition Assumptions for Market Segments
  • Other Important Assumptions
  • Perceived Opportunities
  • Opportunity Screening Worksheets
  • Perceived Threats
  • Industry Scenario
  • Winner’s Profile
Section 5: STRATEGIES
  • Strategic Assessments
  • Strategic Issues
  • How Many Ways Could We Shoot Ourselves in the Foot?
  • Strategies
Section 6: GOALS AND OBJECTIVES
  • Mission Statement
  • Goals
  • Objectives
Section 7: ACTION PLANS
Section 8: BUDGETS
  • Operating Budget
  • Investment Budget
  • Cash Flow Budget
  • Five Year Operating Budget
Section 9: SCHEDULES
  • Time Worksheet
  • Personal Annual Schedule
  • Planning Schedule
  • Monitoring Schedule

A Few Testimonials

Simplified Strategic Planning provided us a straightforward process that helped our already successful organization set a much clearer direction for the future.

Ed Engle, Jr.

President, Rima Manufacturing Company

A system that is very well honed. Important for those who are serious about planning but need to make every second count.

Dean Arnold

VP of Public Operations, Kenco Group, Inc.

Our company is just completing its 2nd cycle of Simplified Strategic Planning. We are expanding the process to additional divisions for the 3rd cycle.

Scott Christensen

Project Manager, Hormel Foods

Thank you for providing me with what I firmly believe to be the two most productive days of my business career. What you provided us was a clearly developed step by step process for developing a strategy. We now have focus, commitment and high employee morale. In short, we now know where we want to go and how we are going to get there. This focus, commitment and morale has resulted in our company achieving the INC. Magazine list of the 500 fastest growing companies.

William J. Costello

President, Accu Bite Dental, Inc.

As the chairman of [the strategic planning] effort your program has given me the tools I will need to clearly move our organization through the development and ultimate implementation of our strategic plan. I’m confident that I am now ready to lead this effort for our company.

Kevin Lapanne

Executive VP, Dooley & Mack Constructors Incorporated

A system that is very well honed. Important for those who are serious about planning but need to make every second count.

G. Alex Bernhardt, Sr.

Chairman and CEO, Bernhardt Furniture Company

What we accomplished…was unprecedented in our company’s history…we have defined a consensus among the top management as to what kind of a company we will be for the next five years. Establishing this shared vision and the means to achieve it would not have been possible without strategic planning. This process is extremely well organized and compelling while allowing the special human attributes of our organization to flourish.

Harris C. Footer

President and CEO, Easy Day Manufacturing Company

A strategic planning process that is based on years of experience – not ivory tower theories. Appropriate for companies with no time for ‘fluff’.

Ruth Ann Church

Project Manager, Great Lakes Trade Adjustment Assistant

Using Simplified Strategic Planning, VPI tripled sales over 5 years. It has helped us identify opportunities, better understand our markets, and focus our resources to attain the business results we desired…it has contributed in a significant way to VPI achieving our growth and profit objectives.

T. Godfrey Mackenzie

VP, Vinyl Plastics, Inc.

The Simplified Strategic Planning process…provides a solid theoretical approach that is applied in a very ‘real world’ down-to-earth manner. The program does an excellent job of providing a defined framework for the planning process without turning it into a mechanistic ‘fill out the form’ exercise. The framework helped us make sure that we were identifying and analyzing the key issues; it did not do our thinking for us. Finally, I felt the emphasis on the development of specific objectives and action plans are the keys to ensuring that strategic planning isn’t just an interesting annual exercise that subsequently collects dust on a bookshelf. I know the strategic plan we produced will make a major difference in the performance of our business.

Roger A. Carolin

President and CEO, CFM Technologies, Inc.

Testimonial

“Simplified Strategic Planning provides a framework for creating direction in a manner that moves away from guesswork and toward intelligent selection. The end result: a destination of choice, not chance.”

Jack Lowe, Jr., Chief Executive Officer, TD Industries
#2 of Fortune 100 Best Companies to Work for in America

Guarantee

The best part about this offer is that you don’t have to take our word for it – use the manual, and if you are not 100% delighted with it, we will refund 100% of the purchase price.

Template Sample

Are you ready for a streamlined, structured approach to strategy and execution that has delivered billions of dollars of profit increases for companies of all sizes in all industries?

available in loose leaf binder
$247.00 for first copy
additional copies available now or later for $47 each