For an effective strategy review, discuss the outcomes of the previous meeting, analyze current performance gaps, and review new factors detected.
With over 20 years of helping organizations implement their strategies through our platform and consultancy, we have developed a strategy review process that has proven to be results-focused. Organize your strategy meeting according to these perspectives:
- Preparation – update performance metrics and detect new factors.
- 1. Last Meeting Outcomes Recap. Follow up on the outcomes of the previous strategy review.
- 2. Current Performance Overview. Review performance gaps and conduct root cause analysis.
- 3. Analysis of New Factors. Discuss new factors emerging in the business landscape.
Preparation: Update Performance Metrics
Prerequisite: It is assumed that you have a properly formulated and described strategy, where the high-level strategy is cascaded into functional and strategic scorecards, with a clear decomposition into goals, initiatives, metrics, and risks. If your strategy is not yet implemented, you can find guidance in our strategy implementation system.
Before the strategy review session, update scorecards with fresh performance data:
- For manually updated metrics, list the KPIs that need updating or were not updated on time.
- List the initiatives with approaching deadlines.
Use analytical methods to find performance gaps. You should focus on:
- Identifying trends
- Detecting anomalies
- Finding correlations
- Benchmarking
Preparation: Detect New Factors
Create or update functional scorecards focused on strategic analysis of the business landscape:
- Add any new external factors (PESTEL analysis or SWOT).
- Map significant moves by competitors (Five Forces Analysis).
- Track shifts in stakeholder needs (Stakeholder analysis).
- Review upcoming regulations in relation to existing controls (GRC controls scorecard).
- Register new risks in the context of the existing strategy (Risk Management scorecard).
AI-powered tools can assist in this process. For example, users of BSC Designer can pass data from existing analysis scorecards and ask AI to compare it against the latest known trends, risks, and regulations.
1. Last Meeting Outcomes Recap
A typical strategy meeting wraps up with actionable hypotheses and owners assigned to those hypotheses. Begin the meeting with a brief strategy presentation, then follow up on the outcomes of the previous meeting.
Possible questions to ask:
- What were the actionable insights from the last meeting?
- What was implemented? What are the results?
- What challenges were detected? How should we revise our approach?
2. Root Cause Analysis of Performance Gaps
Discuss the performance gaps and anomalies that were identified. During the meeting, focus on analyzing the root causes and formulating hypotheses to test.
From a software automation perspective:
- Use dashboards to visualize data.
- Formulate findings as new action plans, hypotheses, or goals.
Possible questions to ask:
- What anomalies were detected?
- Where did the performance fall short of expectations?
- What are the possible root causes?
- What is the general trend? How is the quarter-over-quarter or year-over-year performance?
- What are the results of internal and external benchmarking?
3. Analysis of New Factors in the Business Landscape
Use the results of strategic analysis to review new factors shaping the business environment, such as changing stakeholder needs, external factors, competitors, and risks.
Questions to consider:
- How have the needs of stakeholders changed? (Use Stakeholder Analysis template)
- Have any new opportunities been detected?
- Are there new external factors relevant to our organization? (Use PESTEL template)
- Were any new relevant risks identified? (Review and update the risk register scorecard)
- Have there been any changes in competitor behavior? (Use Five Forces template)
Toolkit to Manage Insights
At every step of the review, software automation provides relevant contextual information and helps align the existing strategy with findings and generated insights. The choice of tools depends on the nature and scale of the insights.
Before the meeting:
- Gather ideas by sending emails to a dedicated address (in BSC Designer, such ideas will be mapped as initiatives).
- Ask participants to update their KPIs and analysis scorecards (see the preparation step).
- Upload relevant documents directly to the goals or KPIs to facilitate future discussions.
During the meeting:
- For performance anomalies, note valuable findings as comments on a KPI with the relevant date.
- For action plans, add comments to the initiatives.
- Map new insights as hypotheses for the goals.
- Map new metrics and risks directly to the goals in the scorecard.
- When discussing goals, KPIs, dashboards, or maps, use direct link tool (especially useful for online meetings).
Strategy Meetings on the Corporate Governance Scorecard
From the perspective of corporate governance, ensure the regularity of strategy meetings and keep trackable records of the meetings.
For regularity tracking:
- On the governance scorecard, create a new indicator called “Regular strategy meeting.”
- Set the indicator’s update interval to the expected frequency of meetings (usually quarterly).
- Assign a responsible person.
- Upload relevant documents to this indicator (meeting agenda and summary).
For trackable meeting outcomes:
- Generate reports that include the strategy map, dashboard, performance data, and meeting notes (the report format can be customized via the Report dialog).
- Access the audit trail for a detailed change log.
Alexis is a Senior Strategy Consultant and CEO at BSC Designer, with over 20 years of experience in strategic planning. Alexis developed the “5 Step Strategy Implementation System” that helps companies with the practical implementation of their strategies. He is a regular speaker at industry conferences and has published over 100 articles on strategy and performance management, including the book “10 Step KPI System”. His work is frequently cited in academic research.