Strategic planning is a very useful process when determining or changing the basic thrust of one’s laboratory business. It is different from operational business planning on two important fronts: first, it is built on an assessment of the external as well as the internal environments (SWOT analysis) and, second, it is the purview of senior laboratory management. We customize our approach to strategic planning to best suit a particular client’s needs and situations.
Environmental AssessmentWe conduct a laboratory industry assessment and synthesize the data into useful information for planning purposes. Laboratory industry assessments usually include marketplace assessment, competitor assessment, technology assessment, economic assessment, and government/regulatory assessment. External opportunities and threats are characterized and profiled.
Internally the operation is assessed on the following parameters: management abilities and effectiveness, productivity, cost effectiveness, appropriateness of scope of services, customer satisfaction, employee satisfaction, safety, and quality. Output from this internal assessment includes a summary of the organization’s strengths and weaknesses.
Group FacilitationWe work with your planning team to facilitate the development of the new organizational mission, vision and guiding principles based on findings and conclusions from the environmental assessment.
To fill the “gap” between current state and the future state vision, both positioning and performance strategies are developed and augmented with the appropriate business cases to ensure implementation proceeds as desired.
Client Outcomes
- Customized environmental assessment
- Mission and vision
- Guiding principles for rapid decision making
- Identification, evaluation and selection of strategies
- Set of objectives, goals, plans and budgets
- Performance monitoring
- Annual recycling