“Plans are everything, planning is nothing”—Dwight D. Eisenhower

In my experience, there are two types of organizations—those that plan and those that don’t. Unfortunately, the ones that do plan tend to lean toward a once-a-year frenetic, got-to-get-it done approach with nothing to back it up once the plan is done. So then we have a plan, but no specifics as to how the plan will come to fruition or how to deliver the goods. It’s not a criticism, but rather the reality.

The overall planning process in developing a strategic plan and an operational plan provides two critical values to ...