Importance of Strategic Planning

What is the importance of Strategic Planning? Well there are at least two ancient sages that say that and they are Sun Tzu and Han Fei Zi.

In conclusion, those who have considered more details during planning and assessment in the temple will win while those who have considered fewer details will lose. The more details considered, the higher the chances of winning and vice versa. How much more certain is defeat if no planning is done at all? By observing the planning and assessment process, I am able to see whether victory or defeat is expected. - Sun Tzu Art of War, Chapter 1

Strategy, it decides between success and failures, thus its assessment is of utmost importance. - Han Fei Zi, Chapter 2

Well I can guess most of you would have said: "Of course I know strategy is important. Its obvious". Wait don't go away yet. You know strategy is important, so are you achieving your dreams, or in the process of achieving your dreams? If you are, think about how much planning have you done for the your strategy to achieve your dreams. I am quite sure there is a handful of you out there who only manage to sit down for 1hr (hopefully this is an underestimate) to do the planning and research. I know because I also tend to do that. The reason is because we find it quite 'painful' to do it especially when we know circumstances change and we might have to change or even scrap the strategy, thus finding it a waste of time.

But let me assure you, beside the importance of strategic planning, during your planning and assessment, you can learn a lot of things on the way which will cut down your learning curve in the future. So do make it a habit of planning your strategy and also assessing its effectiveness maybe once a week. Learn how to set goals and execute your strategy well. All the best in achieving your dreams!

Related Books

Stages of Talent Management

After reading so much about Ancient China's History and Military Works. I have gathered that there are three stages of using talents and all require great skills and wisdom. The three stages are as follows:

1) Recognize Talents
2) "Buy" Talents
3) Use Talents

Recognize Talents (识人)

Before you can even think about using talents, you must first be able to recognize one. How to recognize one? Well in this day and age, where information are plenty. 'Googling' for talents maybe something a company can look into. 'Google' the skills that you require and seek out the website contributors of those sites you think might lead you to the talent you are seeking. Another way of finding and recognizing talents is to ask those you know to recommend one. Usually, if one bother to recommend, even if it is only one, you should spend time to look into his recommendation. Would you recommend someone for the job if he is not good?

"Buy" Talents (得人)

Now what do I mean by "buying" talents? Very simply put, to have your talent pledge loyalty to you. Why is this so? Very simple, if you are not able to gain the loyalty of the talent you are seeking, do you think he will give you his best? So recognize the needs of your talents and give it to them where possible. Now, providing a huge renumeration package can only buy that much amount of loyalty. It has to be accompanied with other intangibles like nice working environment, good working relationship with subordinates and supervisor and so on.

Use Talents (用人)

After you have recognize and "buy" the talents, then you have to know how to use the talents. You have to put him in a position that would allow his talents to add the greatest value to the company. This comes with giving an adequate amount of authority to his position as well. Because even if you put him in a position that will allow him to use his talents to the fullest, if you 'tie' him up without giving enough authority to make decision, it is equivalent to not using him at all.

So these are a brief description of the three stages of using talents. Hope it helps in your human resource management.

Recruitment Ads

Everytime I look at the Recruitment Ads in the newspapers, I cannot help but wonder, doesn't the company knows that these ads are also a form of advertising for them? What is recruitment ads for anyway? Just to find someone to fill in a position? Or you are finding the best person to fill in the position. If your reason is the latter, I think you should put in more effort in your ads. Because most of these ads are boring. Black and white only, no fanciful words to capture attention at all. Logos are not even colored.

Let me show some advantages if you put in some effort in your recruitment ads.

1) Your ads must capture as much attention as possible. The more people notice your ads, it builds on your brand equity which is good even if you did not manage to hire anyone. Capturing attention would also mean more people will apply for the job as well, having a large pool to choose from should be a better headache for the Human Resource Department then to choose from a small pool of averages.

2) Have a job description that gives prestige to the job. The more prestigious the job sounds, the more people are going to apply, because it will capture their emotions as well. They would feel that they are contributing a lot to society and company. Job description can sometimes send a nice signal to consumers as well since job applicants are consumers at the end of the day. For example," Looking for good personalities that can make our clients feel at ease." Such sentence would firstly, make the applicant feel good since he/she is making someone day nice. Secondly, any consumer who sees this would think that "Hmmmm.... this company is good since they are more customer oriented which means my needs can be met." Don't you think so?

3) Always have another email to welcome anyone who is interested to join the company. Since you have already advertised, adding another line to the advertisement does not cost much and it sends the signal that the company value talents. Again this will build on the company's goodwill.

Of course there are other ways as well to extract more value from your recruitment ads, but I shall leave that to the readers.

Cheers!

Waiting in and out

Was at a bank today to settle some personal stuff. Well, as the bank is located at a basement, the queue that started to form up was in a place that is not well ventilated at all. Thus most of the people have to queue up feeling hot and sweaty.

Now would it not be better if the bank had let their customers wait in comfort instead? The bank can still start at the stated opening hours, but when the customers are waiting in comfort, tempers are not that bad, and we know that when a customer is in a bad temper, fury may be unleashed to your front line stuff. Your frontline stuff would then have a good challenge in front to pacify the customer and also offer a level of service that can satisfy customer expectation.

By making the work of your employee easier, it can reduce the turnover rate and it makes the working environment better as well, and how much does it costs your company? Nothing because it is the environment which you had already provided. So practically no costs at all. Think about it. A small gesture of letting your customer to wait in comfort will improve customer experience with you, improve work environment for your employee and reduce (to a certain extent) employee turnover.

Cheers!