Blog Post

Michelle Kloss (Carroll Community College) offers her takeaways from an insightful session at the SCUP 2024 Annual Conference.

The first session I attended Monday morning at the SCUP 2024 Annual Conference in Philadelphia gave me much to think about. It was timely because I am preparing to develop a new strategic plan at my home institution, Carroll Community College.

The session, led by Liz Nilsen, acting director of the Agile Strategy Lab at the University of North Alabama (and co-author of Strategic Doing: Ten Skills for Agile Leadership) and Ellen Koski, institutional researcher and strategic planning coordinator at Northern Michigan University, focused on how the practice of Strategic Doing can focus and energize strategic plan development and implementation.

As Nilsen noted, Strategic Doing is an agile methodology, grounded in appreciative “framing questions” that support a team in scaffolding to “bumper sticker” ideas, clear outcomes, and dedicated tasks.

Speaking from my own experience, designing activities to support a team as they draft a new strategic plan can be a daunting exercise. There are many elements the group should consider as a plan is developed, such as alignment between plan components and the institutional mission, vision, and values; ongoing priorities and initiatives; the national, regional, and local landscape in higher education; and internal and external data and metrics.

Yes, it is challenging to help the group integrate substantial information as they generate ideas for a new strategic plan. But, as Nilsen and Koski posit, a structured methodology such as Strategic Doing can organize and streamline the group’s work. As a bonus, beyond providing an overall structure, Strategic Doing also emphasizes the eventual implementation of the plan and the inherently iterative character of planning and continuous improvement.

Several elements of the Strategic Doing framework appealed to me. Strategic Planning can sometimes be marked by imposing, top-down overtones. It can be difficult for each institutional stakeholder to recognize how they fit into and support a plan’s goals and objectives, often drafted by a small group of campus leaders.

Strategic Doing feels more grassroots and from the ground up. The approach is based on asking team members accessible questions that encourage creativity, brainstorming, and innovative thinking. For example: What could we do? Or an example that reins in ideas to acknowledge available resources and define strategic direction: What should we do?

Through Strategic Doing, planning team members position relevant and current issues and challenges, steeped in their institution’s or unit’s passions and priorities, as framing questions that look toward the future. If I were to write a framing question for my current institution’s diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging efforts, it might read: Imagine a culture of inclusion and belonging for all members of the Carroll community. What would that look like?

The framing question encourages the visioning element essential to strategic planning, helping to move the group beyond the day-to-day to conceptualize the transformative change that an effective strategic plan can engender.

Another attractive aspect of Strategic Doing is the dynamic nature of the question-to-outcome-to-focused-task process. A frequent criticism of strategic plans is that they are developed in a flurry of activity but then placed on the proverbial shelf and thought of only a few times a year when progress reports are due.

The elements of the Strategic Doing framework emphasize engagement, process, and motion. Once teams have defined and described the vision that emerges from their framing question, they succinctly identify an action that would bring the vision to fruition. That is the bumper sticker idea. Teams also name a specific, descriptive outcome and a focused project or milestone representing a key step toward realizing the desired vision. This is something Northern Michigan University calls a “pathfinder project.” It is easy to imagine the energy and enthusiasm that could surface organically as planning teams identify the elements of the Strategic Doing framework.

In my work at Carroll Community College and several sessions at this year’s SCUP annual conference, the importance of genuine and expansive stakeholder engagement in strategic planning is clear. As we look toward developing a new strategic plan at Carroll, we are establishing multiple ways to collect input, especially from individuals external to the institution—those community members who are not (yet) connected to the College. We will prioritize communication about the strategic plan as it is developed in the coming months and when it is ready to launch and implement. The Strategic Planning Team has begun discussing the College’s marketing and communications, social media, and website to draw the community into strategic planning.

It was validating to hear at the SCUP conference of other institutions successfully implementing best practices. The opportunity to further refine and enhance processes around the development and implementation of a strategic plan with methodologies such as Strategic Doing is energizing. It is the motivation and inspiration each of us hope for when we attend a national conference.

Author Biography

Michelle Kloss, PhD, is vice president of effectiveness, integrity, and accountability at Carroll Community College in Westminster, Maryland. She leads strategic and institutional planning and oversees institutional effectiveness, institutional integrity and compliance, accreditation, digital learning and media, disability support services, student care and integrity, and campus police. Kloss was previously the associate provost of assessment and institutional effectiveness and associate vice president of curriculum and assessment in Carroll’s academic affairs division. She serves as vice-chair of the Maryland Online Board of Directors and sits on the Board of Directors for Quality Matters. Kloss earned her PhD in art history and archaeology from the University of Maryland.