PM TIPS & TECHNIQUES:

The New Face of Strategic Planning: Bridging it with Project Management is the Key to Success

By Bruce McGraw

With the current economy in crisis, businesses are scrambling to stay afloat. Many are abandoning their strategic, long term objectives for quick fixes and short-sighted survival tactics. Some of today’s most popular business books from The Tipping Point to Freakonomics feature companies that have stumbled upon greatness without an ounce of strategic planning involved. And with the rapid evolution of real-time media, virtual offices and globalization, companies seemingly have to change their game plans on a daily basis to keep up.

This frenetic pace of work has rendered the often slow and cumbersome strategic planning process irrelevant. In fact, you could say the field of strategic planning is undergoing its own identity crisis. The Strategic Leadership Forum, the international professional association, has now been out of existence for several years. And few graduate schools offer strong strategic planning courses as a part of their curriculums.

But it’s the failure to build a bridge between the strategic planning process and project management’s planning process that is a major reason strategic plans don’t work.

To read entire paper (click here)

About the Author Bruce A. McGraw Bruce A. McGrawis the CEO of Cognitive Technologies (www.cogtechinc.com), a professional services firm delivering project and program management services, products, and PMO tool implementation to commercial and government clients. Mr. McGraw holds an MS in Technology Management from the University of Maryland's University College and a BS in Business Administration from the University of South Carolina. Mr. McGraw is a certified Project Management Professional (PMP) and is an active member of the Project Management Institute. He has trained in four project management methodologies, has authored numerous articles, and presented workshops in a variety of topics, including managing virtual project teams.

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