Strategy Survival Guide

More documents

Recommendations

Info

Strategy Survival Guide Version 2.1 Prime Minister’s Strategy Unit home | strategy development | strategy skills | site index Strategy Skills > Managing the Project Defining accountability > in practice As the project is planned it is important to determine the appropriate governance structures. This should include identifying a sponsor Minister and whether it is appropriate to establish a Steering Group. Where possible, it is a great advantage to identify a Minister who will be the project's sponsor. This will help to gain senior buy-in to the project from the outset, and also provide someone to consult about the political feasibility of emerging conclusions and recommendations. It can also be very useful to have a project Steering Group. The traditional role of the Steering Group is to provide a steer and take decisions at key stages in the project. Members should include key project stakeholders and may include external stakeholders, if appropriate. The key to a successful Steering Group is getting the balance right between breadth and depth of experience. There are also other roles for a Steering Group: • Advice on content • Stakeholder buy-in • External discipline for the team. These roles may not be fulfilled by a single group. Content work in some cases is best done separately, for example through expert panels, bilateral sessions with stakeholders etc. It is generally advisable to have 3-4 meetings of the Steering Group during the life of the project. The objective of each meeting is to provide an update on project progress and to seek advice and consensus at key decision points. In practice, this means that there is likely to be a meeting at the end of each phase of the project, to discuss project outputs. For example, during the Justification & Set-up phase of the project, the Steering Group should agree the project plan. Steering Group Meetings should be factored into the project plan, as key milestones. It takes a lot of work to prepare for these meetings, so holding more than 3 or 4 could mean that servicing the Steering Group could become overly burdensome. In addition or as an alternative to the Steering Group, it may be useful to have an Expert Advisory Group. This is a small group of industry, sector or issue experts who are used to providing technical input and advice, and can act as a sounding board and reality check on emerging conclusions. It is advisable to establish the Group early in the project as it can take stakeholders some time to identify the most appropriate representatives. The Advisory Group can also feed into the development of the project approach if they are involved early in the process. Strategy Survival Guide – Strategy Skills Page 72
Defining accountability In Practice: An SU Project Our project was accountable to at least three types of oversight groups. A ministerial steering group was essential for the high-profile and sensitive issues such as the one with which we were engaged. With a senior cabinet minister as sponsor minister, we were able to open doors, challenge sacred cows and had a natural champion for a bold new agenda. We took this steering group through our thinking step-by-step so that they could reach the same conclusions as the project team. They provided some valuable political guidance on what would and what would not fly. Inevitably, pressure on their time meant we could only meet once every two or three months so we made sure we got the maximum value and clearest possible steer from those meetings. In between those meetings, a senior officials group provided more hands-on guidance in overseeing the direction of work. They met every 2-6 weeks at different stages in the project. As they had a wider portfolio of responsibilities, their main function will be to help the team distinguish between ‘wood’ and ‘trees’. We found it is very easy for full-time team members to get overly absorbed in detailed issues and lose sight of wider issues. Finally, we convened a number of ad hoc expert advisory groups. They were useful in providing an external reality check on our emerging conclusions. The non-governmental participants ensured that our thinking was not too Whitehall-centric and helped us to identify best-practice elsewhere and leading-edge thinking in the academic research community. This had the added benefit of ensuring that we had credibility with a wider group of stakeholders when we were ready to announce new initiatives. Strategy Survival Guide – Strategy Skills Page 73
Page 1:
Strategy Strategy Survival Survival
Page 4 and 5:
Strategy Survival Guide Version 2.1
Page 6 and 7:
Building an Evidence Base 113 Data
Page 8 and 9:
A Framework for Strategic Direction
Page 10 and 11:
These four components need to be co
Page 12 and 13:
Page 14 and 15:
Page 16 and 17:
Page 18 and 19:
Page 20 and 21:
Page 22 and 23:
Page 24 and 25: Strategy Survival Guide Version 2.1
Page 50 and 51: Recruiting a team In Practice: SU G
Page 52 and 53: • Commitment to a common purpose
Page 54 and 55: Away-days A project away-day is ano
Page 56 and 57: WHY ...are you telling me this? SO
Page 60 and 61: Try to put into practice the princi
Page 62 and 63: Encouraging creativity In Practice:
Page 64 and 65: There are clear differences between
Page 80 and 81: Identifying key stakeholders and th
Page 82 and 83: Engaging with stakeholders Having i
Page 86 and 87: • What channels do we know don’
Page 90 and 91: Preparing the Story Once you have a
Page 94 and 95: development process include brainst
Page 100 and 101: Reinforcing Loops A + Balancing Loo
Page 102 and 103: Structuring the thinking - Systems
Page 104 and 105: Opportunities • Where are the goo
Page 108 and 109: Structuring the thinking - PESTLE I
Page 110 and 111: Revolution This is creativity at it
Page 112 and 113: For example, Sub-problem: My collea
Page 114 and 115: Structuring the thinking - Creativi
Page 118 and 119: in The Magenta Book) are rigorous m
Page 122 and 123: • Avoid asking the same question
Page 124 and 125:
Expectations can be shaped by a num
Page 126 and 127:
Collecting data - Surveys In Practi
Page 128 and 129:
Page 130 and 131:
Collecting data - Interviews & focu
Page 132 and 133:
Step One: Define the problem explic
Page 134 and 135:
• Are the units correct? Step Sev
Page 136 and 137:
Analysing data - Modelling In Pract
Page 138 and 139:
Page 140 and 141:
The Five Forces Framework can be us
Page 142 and 143:
References Structure, Conduct, Perf
Page 144 and 145:
Page 146 and 147:
Symbols • What language and jargo
Page 148 and 149:
Page 150 and 151:
• Put a contact name, telephone n
Page 152 and 153:
Learning from others - Internationa
Page 154 and 155:
4. Functional Benchmarking or Gener
Page 156 and 157:
Page 158 and 159:
Strengths • Quantitative forecast
Page 160 and 161:
Page 162 and 163:
3. Bring drivers together into a vi
Page 164 and 165:
Scenario development In Practice 1:
Page 166 and 167:
Scenarios used in the Strategy Unit
Page 168 and 169:
groups at random. In other words, t
Page 170 and 171:
Page 172 and 173:
events. There are a number of diffe
Page 174 and 175:
Multi-criteria analysis In Practice
Page 176 and 177:
Page 178 and 179:
Cost-benefit & cost-effectiveness a
Page 180 and 181:
Page 182 and 183:
For further material, see the Ratio
Page 184 and 185:
Page 186 and 187:
Compelling vision for action - the
Page 188 and 189:
Page 190 and 191:
Page 192 and 193:
Designing an implementation plan In
Page 194 and 195:
Creating Public Value http://www.nu
Page 196 and 197:
National Statistics http://www.stat
Page 198 and 199:
Page 200 and 201:
Page 202 and 203:
Page 204 and 205:
Driver trees 97 Econometric modelli
Page 206 and 207:
management 17, 20, 27, 34, 45 outpu
Page 208:
Strategy Unit, Admiralty Arch, The
show all

Strategy Survival Guide

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

Delete template?

Save as template?