No video for this project, but you are encouraged to contact me with any questions.

 

Midterm: A Strategic Plan

Technology for its own sake is often little more than a novelty. This class is about technology for the sake of meeting objectives, achieving goals, and getting things done. Therefore, this assignment is your opportunity to demonstrate you can produce a plan that communicates a clear strategy.

objective

Develop a strategic plan, incorporating the technologies and practices covered in class, complete with all of the details needed to put it into action

requirements

Employ technologies discused in class

Clear goal(s): e.g., launch a new product, boost sales revenue, enhance employee collaboration etc.

Clear objective(s) with metrics: e.g., reduce employee turnover by 12%, increase online sales coversions by 25%, gain 1,000 Facebook Fans, sell 80% of unit stock, etc.

Clear identification of people: e.g., describe the people that will enable you to achieve your objectives, what you know about them and their behavior, etc.

Clear identification of your strategy: e.g., describe how you are going to work with/ enable/ entice/ incentivize/ etc. your people to achieve your objectives. Will you provide incentives? Will you play to their altruistic nature? Will you tap into their passion or energy for a certain product, service, or franchise? (Note: this should not be a discussion of technology.)

Clear identification of the necessary technologies: e.g., which technologies, or platforms will you implement in order to execute your strategy? Will you use a custom website? Facebook Page? iPhone app? Twitter campaign? Blog written by a noted authority in your field? (Note: you are not limited to a single technology and I recommend using multiple ones to demonstrate an understanding of them.)

first steps

Choose an existing organization (anything from a taco truck to General Motors). Ask yourself these questions in advance and include the relevant answers in your final deliverable:
  • Is it a business, not-for-profit organization, government agency... ?
  • How large is your organization in terms of people, and financial details (annual revenues, etc.)?
  • What is your industry position (market leader, niche provider, start-up, etc.)?
  • How (what channels and strategies) is your organization currently communicating to its internal and external stakeholders? (This question may not be relevant if you are choosing a start-up that only has a couple of employees. But existing organizations should have a communications infrastructure/process in place. If you have trouble answering this question it's okay to make something up, but you need to demonstrate you at least thought about the current 'status quo'.)
Identify your people (a.k.a. Stakeholder Group) and start to learn about them (per the requirements above). Here are some typical groups:
  • Internal groups: employees, suppliers, business divisions, etc.
  • External groups: existing customers, potential customers, shareholders, regulators, media figures, etc.
Define your objectives. Here are some additional examples:
  • Reduce employee turnover rate by 25% in 24 months.
  • Increase number of unique visitors to website by 30% in 6 months.
  • Improve website traffic conversion [when a visitor makes a purchase, or does something else you want them to] rate to 1 sale per 1000 unique visitors.
  • Raise pre-launch awareness of new vendor information system among at least 75% of suppliers from "not informed" to "well-informed" (with 25% being at least "somewhat informed") by product launch date.
  • Reach 1,000 fans on our Facebook Page
At this point you may be asking, "What makes a good objective?" Should it be 5% or 95%? It's a question every organization struggles with because anything could happen. Here's a tip: research performance data for your organization or by reading case studies of similar approaches (a good case study will often include a measurement against initial objectives).

A common approach, especially with new ventures, is to set a modest target. 

If you wanted to be super resourceful, you could reach out via phone or e-mail and ask somebody in your industry what they think a good target objective would be.
Write your Strategic Plan to achieve the objective. Your plan must include:


A situation analysis where you provide:
  • a brief background on your chosen organization;
  • a background on your chosen stakeholder group (what do you know about these people that is relevant to your plan?);
  • the current methods or systems in place for communicating to your chosen stakeholder group; and,
  • the degree to which the current situation is (or is not) able to achieve your defined business objective.
A proposal of the new communication strategy, where you provide:
  • the three differentiating points about the new strategy (i.e., its strengths);
  • a rationale for the new direction and how it will achieve your defined business objective (draw from your situation analysis and any other opportunities/threats that support your case); and,
  • an assessment of any risks presented by your proposal.
An outline of the (new media) tactic(s) used in implementing your communication strategy, where you provide:
  • a description of each tactic and how your organization will use it (e.g., how frequently content/messages will be provided and by whom);
  • a plan for creating the new media communication channel (e.g., subscribe to a service, purchase commercial software, integrate into current website, etc.)
  • a discussion of issues and specifics pertinent to each tactic (e.g., how would a blog handle visitor comments, would the podcast have a voice-mail box, etc.); and,
  • a measurement plan with methods (analytics package, 3rd party service, etc.) and performance targets (e.g., unique visitor traffic, number of comments, video plays, search engine placement, links/embeds, behavioral-based goals, etc.) specific to each tactic.
  • mock-ups of your proposed tactics.
    • These are non-working models of the new media tactics you are proposing.
    • They should be detailed enough to help "sell" your proposed new media tactics.
    • They can be visual, say in the case of a blog or video; they could be sound snippets from a podcast you will use; a logo for an internal social network with some rough sketches of the interface, a customized Twitter page, etc.
A discussion of contingencies in the event foreseen or unforeseen risks occur. Here are some suggestions/examples:
  • under what circumstances the proposed channel or communication program should be shut down or modified;
  • how lack of participation or attention by your stakeholders will be addressed;
  • how excessive participation or attention by our stakeholders will be addressed (e.g., information overload and the "viral" effect);
  • how spam and other content-related issues (censorship, privacy, copyright etc.) will be communicated and mitigated; and,
  • ownership of any intellectual property that may be generated through stakeholder participation.
Source it and summarize. Some finishing touches:
  • An executive summary (approximately half a page) of your plan that answers the question "What's in it for me?" for the person who will approve your plan. Please Google "executive summary" for some ideas and guidance.
  • A list of sources (with links, or other notes). APA style is preferred.

grading

600 points possible

Points off for cutting corners or other evidence of a lackluster effort.

Creativity is welcome and encouraged

Situation analysis (20%)

Strategy (30%)

Tactics implementation outline (30%)

Contingencies/risk mitigation (10%)

Formatting ("polish") and presentation (10%)

Length and formatting: You have creative license over how you format and organize this document. Some things like the executive summary should naturally go at the beginning, but organize the contents however you wish.

Format: see deliverables and choose either Presentation or Document.

There is no prescribed length. Your job is to present a plan that convinces me it will work and that you have thought through the details using a strategic planning approach (e.g. POST). If you include all the content outlined above, it should be a substantial document, but with as much control as you have over the formatting and presentation, giving a "length" would not be possible.

 

deliverable(s)

Choose "Deliver via Presentation" OR "Deliver via Document."

  1. Deliver via presentation: Present to me your midterm as a presentation (e.g., PowerPoint, Keynote, Google Presentation, 280slides.com, etc.) via: an in-person appointment; live presentation using gotomeeting.com (I have an account we can use), iChat theater, or some other screen scaring method of your choice; or you record an annotation to your presentation and create an online video I can watch, or use slideshare.net 's audio annotation feature. Using this option, you do not have to have every piece of required information on your slides and can instead cover it in your spoken remarks. Keep in mind with this option that if you have any technology failures, they will count against your Formatting and Presentation points, so make sure you test everything out first.
    1. If you would like to do a live in-person or online presentation, please schedule some time with me ASAP.
    2. Complete the submission form below, or linked here. Post your presentation materials (slides) online, as a reply to this page, in advance of the meeting so I can follow along and make notes. Also include in this post feedback about the midterm assignment itself: was anything unclear? what were the strengths and weaknesses of the assignment? What would you have liked to know at the start that you didn't? This information will help improve the assignment for future classes -- and make the world a better place.
  2. OR Deliver via document: Present to me your midterm as a PDF (from a Word, Pages, Google Doc, etc. file), webpage with hyperlinks, embedded videos and images (if applicable)
    1. Complete the submission form below, or linked here. Post a link to your document online, as a reply to this page. Also include in this post feedback about the midterm assignment itself: was anything unclear? what were the strengths and weaknesses of the assignment? What would you have liked to know at the start that you didn't? This information will help improve the assignment for future classes -- and make the world a better place.
  3. Rate this project and explain your rating with comments about specific strengths/ improvement ideas. Anonymous posts are perfectly acceptable, just log out of the site first.
  4. UIUC Students: Tag your presentation “ADV400Midterm” on delicious.com
  5. SU Students: Tag your presentation “IST400Midterm” on delicious.com

resources & examples

Google Docs | create presentations and documents online

280 Slides | create presentations online

Zoho | create presentations and documents online

SlideShare | view examples of presentations online, including several strategic and new business plans

 

feedback &
submissions