The fundamental long-term strength of a company relies heavily upon the development of a Strategic Plan. This Plan must incorporate clear objectives for each department together with strategies and tactics to achieve each objective. Successful businesses are those that are able to introduce structures and disciplines which allow management to proactively review, expand or change their strategic directions regularly in response to internal or external activity.

Working with our highly skilled team of economists and business practicitioners, Birdwell & Associates can help your company develop a sound, workable, and flexible Strategic Plan--on a departmental or company-wide basis. This may include,

• Business Funding; Debt, Equity, and Alternative Sources
• Business Plans
• Marketing Strategies & Implementation
• Internet Strategies & Web Design
• Market Research on New & Existing Products & Services
• Business Development
• Financial, Treasury, & Budgetary Planning
• Importing, Exporting & International Strategies
• Productivity & Efficiency Strategies
• ERP Planning, Consulting, & Implementation

The M.O.S.T. Approach
One of the key tools used in Strategic Planning is the M.O.S.T. Approach. This approach helps to clarify the Mission, where the business intends to go; The Objectives, the key goals which will help to achieve the mission; the Strategies as to what options are available; and lastly, the Tactics that will be deployed to insure that your strategies are optimized to their fullest.

The key to understanding M.O.S.T. is to recognize that it is both a "top down" and a "bottom up" dynamic process. From the top, clarifying the mission drives the objectives, which creates strategic options, which then forces tactical actions to be taken. From the bottom, every action at the tactical level will help to make the strategies work, all strategies will help to achieve the objectives, and all the objectives will take the business towards the mission.

Businesses fall into many traps by attempting to develop a Strategic Plan, due to internal management biases. By consulting with an external party, you can be assured that an objective approach is developed. In doing so, Birdwell & Associates will insure that your Strategic Plan does not fall prey to the following traps:

• Getting distracted by day-to-day demands from customers, suppliers and competitors.
• Failing to identify new and unique ideas on improving your business operations<./li>
• Failing to get Board and management agreement to this mission.
• Failing to clarify the key objectives that need to be reached (and in what timescale) for the mission to be successful.
• Failing to obtain objective assistance in analysing the strategic options available to satisfy the key objectives.
• Missing out on the strategy stage altogether by going straight from objectives to tactics which leads to a lot of "dead ends" and missed opportunities.
• Not ensuring that everything done at tactical level helps to ensure success of the stategies.
• Failing to properly define timescales, responsibilities, monitoring and control procedures to ensure that implementation moves forward at the necessary speed.

External Strategic Planning helps companies avoid these traps and keeps the business moving forward with a sense of urgency and in a clear direction which "hangs together" from Director to shop floor level.

Vision & Scope of Projects
All projects, no matter how small or large will typically follow this general process in the initial stages. As we move forward, we adjust and tweak our tactics to insure that the strategy and mission is moving forward satisfactorly.

1. Identification of key problems that hamper company development and reaching of owners' and top-management's goals.
2. Analysis of prerequisites for choosing direction of the company development
3. Analysis of operational effectiveness and identification of its improvement reserves
4. Analysis of long-term competitiveness of the company and identification of the limitations of it's improvement
5. Analysis of organizational and resource bounds, which effect the choice of company development alternative
6. Forecasts and evaluations of future performance of the company for each of the developed alternatives (range of products/businesses) by the following criteria

Work Results
The result of this process is the documented Strategic Plan, with a phased implementation horizon for the short term, intermediate term, and long term, approved and negotiated by the key managers of the company. Birdwell & Associates will continue to work with your company to insure that the Plan is on track and moving in the right direction.