By Victor Ochieng’
In a book titled School Administration and Management, Geoffrey Wango avers that a Strategic Plan is one of the documents Principals should have to help them steer schools towards the right direction. It is an important document used in deft management practices to make it easier to manage change and transition.
Foremost, a Strategic Plan is a document that gives an institution sense of vision and purpose. It enshrines stupendous strategies worth implementation with specific timelines — in most cases, five years. It acts as a yardstick that goads school arrowheads to remain transformative, visionary and strategic in their leadership style. The Principal becomes a true supervisor — the one with super vision.
Secondly, in the Tower of Transformational Leadership, Professor George Magoha, admits that in his ten-year tenure as Vice Chancellor of the University of Nairobi, having a Strategic Plan helped him provide legendary leadership.
It is crystal-clear that Strategic Plans aid leaders to stand at a vantage point and have panoramic vision for it is utterly wrong to run institutions while rudderless or blind like bats. It is only myopic and tiny-minded professionals who run schools on auto-pilot basis as they seek solace in statements such as: ‘We shall cross the bridge when we get there’.
Somewhat, when a Strategic Plan is available, it makes managers to see beyond the sea. In the Art of Institutional Leadership, Professor Laban Ayiro postulates that vision is a picture of the future — which produces passion in people. In the sacred scriptures, Habakkuk implores vision-bearers to write the vision on the table and allow those who can read run with it.
A classic case is Thomas Edison. He made the first public demonstration of his incandescent light bulb on December 31, 1879, in Melo Park New York. With the good gift of foresight he heralded, “We will make electricity so cheap that only the rich will burn candles.”
Consequently, Wright Brothers pictured a radiant day when they would soar like birds in the sky. Through vision, they saw a ‘metal capsule’ with wings wending like winds. Serendipitously, on December 17, 1903, the Wright Flyer made its maiden take off from the sandy beaches of North Carolina.
Therefore, at the core of leadership sits the puissance of vision — bright picture of the future. Principals can meet this ambit by treasuring Strategic Planning. They should hire experts to help them craft and draft the document then prop it up with a plausible implementation plan. The document should not gather gust of dust on the shelves because it is there for formality purposes.
It is instructive to note, the content should begin with the foreword done by the Chairperson of the Board of Management. Then — the preface — executive summary woven well by the Principal. There should be the acknowledgement of the committee in the humble preamble to arouse ownership.
Consequently, chapter one should be the rationale of the plan. At that fledgling stage, it is important to point out the process used to arrive at it. For it should be a product of meeting of minds.
In addition, chapter two should enshrine the school philosophy — the school motto, mission, vision, core-values, anthem and theme song. Planners should dedicate chapter three to schools’ core-functions, customers and graduates’ outcome.
Moreover, chapter four should be a situational analysis: starting with contextual analysis — the historical background of the institution. The SWOT analysis should follow — exploring strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. Close to this is the PESTEL Analysis which examines political, economic, socio-cultural, technological, ecological and legal factors affecting the school. Stakeholders and financial analysis should follow.
Penultimately, chapter five should focus on key strategic issues like school leadership and management, development projects and relationship of the school with the community. Chapter six should focus on strategic direction, split into strategic objectives (the what?) and strategies (the how?).
Lastly, the epilogue of the plan should oscillate around implementation plan matrix. It is a table that steers clear on strategy, activity, person responsible, time frame, resources required, sources of funds, assumptions plus output indicators.
The writer is an editor, orator and author. vochieng.90@gmail.com.
