Hey! I’m Shannon. Former Finance Director trying to get local governments operating more strategically...not just planning that way.

Like you and many others in the local government space, I was tired of looking at countless strategic plans and seeing them go nowhere. Elected officials, leadership teams, staff, and the community spending a ton of time (and money) to develop a plan only to put it away after it was adopted. 

I always found myself wondering:

• "How does this relate to me and my team?"
• "What were we supposed to do first?"
• "Why bother if we might get new elected officials in a few years?"
• "What happens if something changes?"
• "How are we supposed to pay for this?"

I heard my colleagues asking the same questions. And watched as the City Manager and leadership team spent hours...or sometimes days...trying to put together a progress report on a plan that none of us had paid much attention to all year long. We had all been a part of the planning process. Yet still couldn't seem to get traction. Different plans. Different teams. I kept seeing it over and over again.

The Finance Director in me shuddered as I kept seeing limited resources going towards plans that would stall out. Not because the plans were bad. And definitely not because the people involved didn't care; local government employees care A LOT and they're great at what they do. The local government leader in me shook my head as I kept seeing excited people slowly becoming skeptical, disengaged, and burnt out. 

I stepped back and started to notice some predictable patterns in plan development and implementation:

1. Organizations put out an RFP for strategic plan development or schedule a planning retreat before getting a read on where the organization is and identifying potential road blocks that might get in the way of good planning or implementation. Capacity problems? Misaligned teams? Communication gaps? Resource needs? If they exist today, they'll show up during development and stall implementation.  
2. No one is on the same page about what a strategic plan is (and isn't) and what the plan should really be doing. Everyone knows the organization should have one...but not one can say exactly why. Everyone has different expectations for the planning process and the plan and no one level sets before planning retreat begins. Mismatched expectations lead to ambiguous plans, uneven buy-in, and interpretation.  
3. People aren't clear on what they should be doing and where they fit into the process. Elected officials, the leadership team, and staff are all confused about where they should be focusing and what they should be doing to develop a plan that connects vision to daily actions. That confusion compounds during implementation and soon you have a lot of people focusing on a priority with no way to actually make any progress. Unclear roles lead to no one knowing who is doing what...and that leads a duplication of efforts or balls being dropped.
4. In-progress work and pre-existing plans aren't considered during plan development. Everyone is excited to come up with new ideas and great solutions. These just get added on top of ongoing initiatives and projects without stopping to consider what, if anything, might need to be dropped or deprioritized. Staff get handed a plan that doesn't integrate with anything they're already doing. There is no method to prioritize and the plan goes cold. 
5. Organizations don't have the frameworks, capacities, or time to easily translate strategy into their day to day world and track progress. A mid to long-term goal from the plan doesn't fit into the daily rhythms of local government work. Underlying organizational challenges, team dynamics, departmental silos, and unclear metrics make bridging that gap even harder.     

I know what it’s like to not have the answers and feel like you spent money and time on a plan that never went anywhere. I also know what it's like to work late into the night putting together a progress report cobbled together from emails that summarize department activities for an entire year of hard work. Or,  trying to align annual departmental the annual budget requests to goals that don't quite fit. I've been there. I've felt the frustration of spending a ton of time and money (both of which are very limited) to create a plan that doesn't go far because departmental silos are blocking progress and the elected officials added another project to a list that is too long already.

All of that...is why I created Stratalysts.  To help local government leaders like you finally take the strategic plan from paper to progress. To help make the day to day easier. To help make progress and impact smoother. To get local governments operating more strategically, not just planning that way.

With over 20 years of experience in local government I bring a fresh, approachable, and resource-sensitive perspective to every project. 

• Prosci Certified Change Management Practitioner (CCMP)
• Certified Six Sigma Green Belt (CSSGB)
• Certified EQ i-2.0 & 360 Practitioner