58 Strategic Leadership
in planning in higher education as they review the literature and discuss their own
travail in trying to implement a process at the University of Northern Colorado.
Wilson (2006) does the same in describing a failed academic planning initiative
at Cal Poly Pomona. In analyzing some of the weaknesses of strategic planning
in the nonprofit world, especially from the governing board’s perspective, Chait,
Ryan, and Taylor (2005) note that many plans lack traction, pattern, realism, and
input from the governing board. In addition, strategic plans often fail to contend
with the pace of change and unforeseen outcomes.
One of the challenges in understanding the process is the use of the term
“strategic planning” itself. The phrase necessarily brings to mind the rational
activity of first formulating and then separately implementing a sequence of steps
to achieve a projected goal. We plan a house by first designing it, and then execute
the blueprints and specifications by coordinating the delivery of materials and the
work of a variety of trades. If planning is truly strategic, however, it defines itself
in terms of changing realities in the competitive environment. That is the very
meaning of “strategic.” This brings contingency, responsiveness, and the need
for resourcefulness and creativity into the ways we both conceive and carry out
strategies. The definition of strategic planning as a rigid series of linear steps and
schedules invariably leads to frustration.
Although the word “planning” continues to be used to describe the strategy
process in higher education, it is often stretched beyond its ordinary meaning
and has come to function as a term of art or figure of speech, defined more by use
than formal definition. In this text we often use the terms “strategic planning,”
“strategy,” “strategy process,” and “strategic decision making” interchangeably,
though we believe the last three terms are preferable.
Given the wide variability in both its use and effectiveness it is time to take
a fresh look at the possibilities for using the process of strategy in higher educa-
tion (cf. Newman, Couturier, and Scurry 2004). After several decades, it has
become a bit stale and perfunctory, or rigid and cumbersome. It often becomes
politicized and unsure of itself. This is a logical moment to seek the renewal and
reconceptualization of strategic planning and strategic management in terms of
strategic leadership.
Evolving Concepts of Corporate Strategy
Many business leaders and students of management have also questioned the
worth of strategic planning because of the rigidities to which it became subject in
earlier decades. For a time, beginning in the 1960s, many large corporations cre-
ated central planning systems that ran in parallel with operational management.
An array of planners specified in advance every facet of the financial, marketing,
sales, and production cycles of all products or services. Strategic planning systems
took on a life of their own through the elaborate programming of sequences of
events around rigid goals, actions, and timetables. Yet the detailed plans were
often out of date even before they were completed, let alone implemented.