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Strategic Planning: Unlocking Success for Your Organization
Episode 883rd July 2023 • Connected Philanthropy • Foundant Technologies
00:00:00 00:34:36

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Marie Palacios, Lead Consultant | Funding for Good

Marie is an expert facilitator, certified by The Institute of Cultural Affairs in the USA, in evidence-based facilitation practices known as the ToP Method. She combines proven facilitation methods and her passion for community to facilitate dynamic and productive meetings. Marie enjoys facilitating community organizing, advocacy, consensus building, and action planning workshops for diverse organizations across the nation. Over the past two decades, Marie has worn every hat imaginable in the nonprofit world: volunteer, board member, program director, executive director, and development consultant. Her nonprofit specialties include strategic planning facilitation, program design, board development, grant writing, and messaging. Marie is bilingual and uses her Spanish skills to provide language access services for businesses and local government sectors, teach Spanish for Professional Courses, and coordinate missions in Latin America through her consulting company, MP Pro Consult. Marie is a native of Morganton, North Carolina, where she lives with her husband and three children.

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Tammy Tilzey:

Hello and welcome to our Foundant Connected Philanthropy podcast.

Tammy Tilzey:

We are privileged to have Marie Palacios from Funding for Good as our guest.

Tammy Tilzey:

Today we will be digging into strategic planning.

Tammy Tilzey:

Marie and the team at Funding for Good have been helping nonprofits

Tammy Tilzey:

develop their strategic plans using.

Tammy Tilzey:

Methodology that focuses on the process.

Tammy Tilzey:

And this focus could help nonprofit leaders engage in strategic

Tammy Tilzey:

planning conversations and come away with a great written plan.

Tammy Tilzey:

I also know funding for Good has been offering trainings,

Tammy Tilzey:

workshops, and resources focused on strategic planning for many years.

Tammy Tilzey:

Marie and her colleague Mandy have also been guest speakers on

Tammy Tilzey:

several educational webinars for us, and they have also offered

Tammy Tilzey:

several articles found on our blog.

Tammy Tilzey:

Our community has definitely benefited from all the wisdom and knowledge

Tammy Tilzey:

they have shared with us over the past years, and we are excited to learn more.

Tammy Tilzey:

Thank you so much for joining us today, Marie.

Marie Palacios:

My pleasure.

Tammy Tilzey:

I am excited to be talking about the process of strategic

Tammy Tilzey:

planning with you today but before we dive into that topic, can you tell

Tammy Tilzey:

me a little bit more about yourself?

Marie Palacios:

Sure.

Marie Palacios:

So as you already said, I'm Marie Palacios and Mandy and I are actually celebrating

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20 years of partnering together in some sense, not just as funding for good.

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We started out both working in the nonprofit sector and subcontracting

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and bartering our services and.

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Have grown into the business of funding for good over the

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years, but my background is all grassroots, hands-on nonprofit work.

Marie Palacios:

So we say, a lot of times you go to trainings or you meet with a consultant

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and they're telling you these, all these great ideas that fill, sound easy.

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But in reality it's like walking through peanut butter.

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And for those of us who have been there and have been on the front

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line serving as an executive director, which I have as a program

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director, which I have development.

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Staff, which I have.

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It's like things sound easy, but we know better.

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So we really, our business model is really helping people, not just telling them

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what they need to do, but giving them tips and tools and showing them how to do it.

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So we hope that any engagement with us, whether it's a short podcast

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or a training or a bootcamp leaves people with something they can

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actually take away and use it today.

Tammy Tilzey:

We've definitely heard that from our community so far.

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They love all of the material tips and just knowledge that you so willingly sh.

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And I'm excited to have you on the podcast today talking about this.

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I think strategic planning is so important and it seems so big

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And I, I wanna make make sure we.

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Talk about how you make it so approachable, and then also the

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resources and assistance that you have available for the folks if

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they need more assistance there.

Tammy Tilzey:

Starting out can you explain why strategic planning and having a strategic

Tammy Tilzey:

plan is so vital for nonprofits?

Marie Palacios:

Oh, absolutely.

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So we're using the word strategic plan, but in the for-profit world, we

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would be using the term business plan.

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So my husband and I have a small construction company.

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It's a for-profit company in addition to my consulting.

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And if we wanted to go to the bank.

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To take out a loan to maybe grow his gutter, cutting his gutter

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installment side of the business, and we need a $30,000 loan for that.

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The first thing the bank is gonna ask us for is, what do you need?

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Why do you need it?

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And they're gonna ask us for three very specific things.

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The first is gonna be, what's your business plan?

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Because they want to see, do you have a plan to actually repay

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that loan and they're gonna get that return on the investment.

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The second thing they're gonna ask is current capacity.

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Where are you now?

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You said you're gonna have 20 employees in two years, but you're

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really a one person show right now.

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What does that look like now?

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And the third thing they're gonna ask is, what's your credit score?

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They wanna see your history of successfully paying back, and we

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see that and we just consider it the norm in the for-profit world.

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But we don't stop to think that in the nonprofit world, our donors are investors.

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They are looking for a return on their investment.

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That return on investment might not be profit, but it's

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purpose, it's meaningful impact.

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So if I give you a thousand dollars or a hundred thousand dollars, I

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wanna know that there's a plan to take those dollars and sew into the mission

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and produce a return on investment in the terms of meaningful impact.

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So when we look at planning for the future and cultivating donors

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and growing our capacity, we have to have a plan to get there.

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We know that only about half of the nonprofits in the country right now

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have a written strategic plan, but a strategic plan is the greatest

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tool in your fundraising toolkit.

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It can double your chances of success if it's done well.

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But it really keeps everyone on the same page.

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So in our world, we tell people, just keeping people on the same page, the

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nonprofit culture, there's a lot of turnover with board rotations, staffing,

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and when we say, oh, we're going to California, California is a big place.

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We may think we're talking about the same thing, but we can, there's

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lots of ways to get to California.

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So a strategic plan.

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Confirms the destination for everyone on the team, board, staff, volunteers, but,

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most importantly, if it has an operational plan with it, it provides the tools

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and timelines to make sure that we're running a three red-legged race where

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everyone's heading in the same direction.

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Otherwise, it's one of those old school strategic planning races where

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everyone's falling over each other.

Tammy Tilzey:

Yeah.

Tammy Tilzey:

Yeah, that makes so much sense.

Tammy Tilzey:

I love that analogy too, of getting what it means to have

Tammy Tilzey:

everybody on the same page.

Tammy Tilzey:

You mentioned those three things that a strategic plan could answer.

Tammy Tilzey:

Are those the key components or are there different components of

Tammy Tilzey:

what constitutes a strategic plan?

Marie Palacios:

There are, but I would venture to say any evidence-based

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comprehensive process should answer at least these three questions.

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The first one is, where are we now?

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Because we really can't determine where we wanna be in the future

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unless we know where we are now.

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If we're standing at a national park and we're trying to get to the upper

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falls, we have to look at that kiosk and agree, this is the path we're on.

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Or you're gonna have lots of we should go left or we should go right?

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So even though it sounds crazy, many board members, staff members, team members in

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general, might not actually have a working knowledge or agree upon where we are.

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We have the capacity to do that.

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No, we don't.

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So where are we now?

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As the first question Every plan should answer.

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That's usually done in the form of a, an analysis, a scan.

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So you might have heard of a SWAT analysis, strengths, weaknesses,

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opportunities, and threats.

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That's an internal analysis at funding for good.

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We don't do swat, we Dota, we end with achievements because who wants

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to end a conversation on threats?

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And I'm like, whoever the brilliant person was that said, let's end

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the whole conversation on threats should revisit so we, Dota.

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And it's a great way to celebrate the organization's achievement with

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all the team members participating.

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It might be an external scan, and those are well known in the community where

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you're looking at the community around to say what's going on in the community.

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So you have internal and external scans to answer the question, where are we now?

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We have an article on funding for goods website.

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If you go to funding for good.org and just use the little search bar

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and put environmental scan, you'll see a breakdown on internal and

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external in some of the models.

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But the second question is, now that we know where we are now, the

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second one is where do we wanna be in three to five years, or whatever

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that designated timeframe is.

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So where do we wanna be and that where do we wanna be in X number of years can look

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different for different organizations.

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In our strategic planning process, we tend to look up as far ahead as

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an organization, looks comfortable.

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It could be 10 years, it could be eight years, it could be 20 years.

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But we really create actionable goals for the next three to five years.

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Automobile industries, cities, municipalities might need to look

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further ahead if there's a lot of infrastructure involved or organizations

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working with infrastructure, because you can't just look two years

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ahead on major infrastructure.

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But we involve a vision process where we want to be in X number of years.

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And then finally, the third question we always answer in our

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process is, how do we get there?

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And that's the strategies and the timelines and all of those things.

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So where are we now?

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Where do we wanna be and how do we get?

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There are the three overarching questions.

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Every really good plan should answer.

Tammy Tilzey:

I've been involved in a couple, board retreats.

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Strategic planning and I always have to coach myself before and I

Tammy Tilzey:

go in there cuz I'm, I I may take over, I may not speak up, I may

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do too much, not enough, whatever.

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Everybody has different personalities and different.

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Comfort with participating in these types of planning processes.

Tammy Tilzey:

So how do you have any areas or tips of advice for how to make a level

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playing field for everyone involved?

Marie Palacios:

Absolutely.

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That's gonna come down almost completely to your facilitator.

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So choosing a facilitator is a huge part of the process.

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This isn't a pitch to say, oh, we're gonna facilitate for you, happy to do that.

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But then you may have someone on your team, you may have someone in your

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community, a volunteer, someone in your community foundation, but choosing

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the right facilitator is going to be imperative when you're looking at leveling

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that playing field for several reasons.

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I've never actually facilitated a process in which I was the executive

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director of the organization.

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Because it is impossible to be a neutral facilitator and open up the conversation

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while being an active participant.

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It's just impossible.

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So if you are an active participant or want to be, then it is probably

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a time to say I should step back and not serve as the facilitator.

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Regardless if you have someone who will do it for free or you invest in a facilitator

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who's qualified, I highly recommend, first of all, getting a facilitator.

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We do have a whole training on that, on strategic planning processes, and we

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say what to expect from a facilitator.

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Also, if you click on that little search bar on funding for.org.

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There's what I call the holy Grail of strategic planning articles,

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and there's a breakdown on what to expect from facilitators,

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how to put a call out for rfp.

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So I won't get into that now, but first is the the facilitator.

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The second is to recognize that in every room you're gonna have

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your abrasive and your persuasive.

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And as a facilitator, I always enjoy both.

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People go, but you don't want the abrasive.

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I do.

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I want a little bit of push pushback.

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Maybe not too much.

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We have to keep it in check.

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But persuasive can be just as dangerous as abrasive or just as

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harmful because when people get pulled along blindly, they make decisions

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they might not have otherwise made.

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Someone could be very convincing and abrasive.

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People can get bulldozed and strong armed into making those decisions.

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Abrasive and persuasive can pull conversations in particular directions

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and encourage the group to make decisions that might not be the soundest choices.

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So always look for the abrasive and the persuasive.

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Identify those pretty early on.

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We make sure that we have kites and the kite flyers in the room.

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So I've never heard this analogy, but it makes sense to me and

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hopefully it will to you.

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Our kites are those people who say, we can be flying a thousand feet in the air.

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Look at all the amazing things we can do.

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And our kite flyers are the ones that are like, yeah, but we got

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500 feet of string, not a thousand.

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They're firmly grounded.

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And these are the realities in which we're operating.

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And when you just have the kites, you have dreams that aren't

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really attached or grounded.

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And if you just have the kite flyers, you don't have the visionaries.

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So capacity building is about adding to your spool of kite string, and a

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strategic planning process gets the kites and the kite flyers in the room and

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says, how can we add more to the spool?

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So maybe we won't get to a thousand feet in this planning process, but

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maybe we'll get to 700 or 750 feet.

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So the planning process allows our kites and our kite flyers to add to that

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string and get a little bit out of their comfort zones each and in their own way.

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And then finally, we have introverts and extroverts.

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So we have abrasive and persuasive.

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We have our kites and our kite flyers.

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And then we have just the way people communicate, which is our

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introverts and our extroverts.

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And if I open up a question and say, where do we wanna be in three years?

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Extroverts, we can create 20 responses.

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I'm an extrovert, as you can tell, but they're not gonna be our best thoughts.

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They're just gonna be stream of consciousness.

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Introverts, by the time they've organized a really beautiful response, we've moved

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on, the conversation's already passed.

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So we use an evidence-based facilitation method that we're trained in called

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the Top Method, and it stands for technology of participation.

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There are lots of evidence-based models out there.

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I highly encourage organizations to look for facilitators who have a

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wealth of knowledge in facilitation technique, evidence-based models,

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lots of experience because the facilitator is a big chunk of success.

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And one of the things that the top method requires and that we appreciate

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is it levels the playing field by giving everyone a focus question.

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We only ask one question at a time.

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We give everyone a set amount of time to quietly.

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Collect their thoughts because how can we collect share our best thoughts if

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we haven't taken time to collect them?

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So that could be three minutes to four minutes or five minutes.

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And then we move into small groups.

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So once we've collected our thoughts using very specific instructions

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we provide in writing, we move into small groups because it's.

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10% harder to achieve consensus for every person after seven in the room.

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So if you're dealing with 21 people in the training session, it's gonna

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be hard to get that agreement.

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So we move into small groups of three and four, and when they can agree, they're

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saying the same thing and I have three or four groups, then we come back together

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and we have four groups of maybe three now we just have to get four groups to agree.

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So breaking into, it's in the educational world called Think, pair, share.

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We use that think pair share model in our strategic planning to level the

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playing field, and it's been really successful to manage all those different

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personality and processing types.

Tammy Tilzey:

Wow.

Tammy Tilzey:

Wow.

Tammy Tilzey:

I love that.

Tammy Tilzey:

And I love the language and you're not saying one type is better than the other,

Tammy Tilzey:

so people will feel validated, they'll feel their role and the importance

Tammy Tilzey:

of it and what they're bringing to the table and that type of a process.

Tammy Tilzey:

And yeah, I

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everyone, We need the pushback.

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We need that pushback to challenge.

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We need the persuasion to say, let's get out of our comfort zone.

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We need all those personalities in the room to get the best product because

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the method we use is consensus based.

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And it's based on the premise that the best plans come out of

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diverse diversity in participation.

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That the better the participation, the more diverse the participation,

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the better your plan will be.

Tammy Tilzey:

That's great.

Tammy Tilzey:

That's great.

Tammy Tilzey:

And I don't know if this ever happens cuz I I haven't participated

Tammy Tilzey:

using that method, but I have seen.

Tammy Tilzey:

Whiteboards filled with ideas and does that ever come outta or happen,

Tammy Tilzey:

often in these planning strategies and then it's just overwhelming.

Tammy Tilzey:

I have an idea of how I would organize it or but sometimes it's just overwhelming.

Tammy Tilzey:

And how do you bring that into, what should we focus first?

Tammy Tilzey:

What should we ignore?

Tammy Tilzey:

What,

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the really awesome thing about the evidence-based

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model that we use to facilitate is it takes into consideration that.

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First we need to collect our thoughts.

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Then we need to share them.

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Then we need to agree upon them, but then we need to organize them.

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So our process actually goes through a, what we call a clustering process

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and we all those ideas, instead of just putting 'em on the board,

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we then say, for example, if it's accomplishments, we'll say which

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ones of these shares similar intent?

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And we start clustering them.

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Or if we're talking about barriers, it might be which

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ones have a similar root cause.

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So we provide a prompt to our participants to help them cluster.

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So we're not just saying, which one of these make sense together?

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Because I can say we're gonna have a marketing strategy.

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If we're talking about strategies, I can say we're gonna have a marketing strategy.

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What's the intent behind it?

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Is it to raise awareness?

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Is it to raise dollars?

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Is it to do something else?

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So the intent behind something is just as important as the strategy put to it.

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So we provide very particular prompts that's only one prompt on a time on

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the board, and everyone helps cluster.

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And then we go through a naming process to say these are the things

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we said we wanna see in five years.

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Looking at the contribution in this particular column,

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what are we talking about?

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And then we agree on the name.

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So our process actually walks through and helps organize that.

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I always felt sorry for the scribe in strategic planning processes.

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Like how do you, it's like collecting stars, shooting stars in the sky

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and getting 'em in a document.

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I believe that the value that a facilitator brings if they've done it

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and done it well, is having a template.

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That and a way, a methodology to collect the information and then put it into

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a written document that can be used.

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So while I'm facilitating another team member is typically scribing all the

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information, so there's no, no one has to actually take time to scribe.

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Every participant from the organization is highly involved.

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Our team members typing everything up and we have created a

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template that I like to call the development director's best friend.

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Because we both worked in development.

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Mandy and I have backgrounds in development and program management,

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and we have created a template that's very visual that you can extract for

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marketing, you can extract for development work, you can extract for programming.

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So taking the ideas and then putting 'em in an editable user-friendly,

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visually appealing document is another part of the process.

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And we see a lot of.

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Organization said, we went through this process, but we got all these notes.

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We don't know where to go from there.

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And that's why when we talk about in our articles and also in our trainings on

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strategic planning, if you ever look at strategic planning, the process, it's on

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our website and it's also in our vault.

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We walk through very particular slides on what to ask your facilitator,

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like what should you be asking?

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What is your methodology?

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What is your process?

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What is included in the end product?

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How are we getting there so that you know what to expect?

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Because honestly, one size doesn't fit all.

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The questions you're asking are great, and every facilitator will have a

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different way of getting to that end goal.

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And one size doesn't fit all.

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So ask the questions, have someone in the room that maybe has facilitated,

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but maybe won't be facilitating because they wanna be an active participant.

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But at the end of the day, there's so many evidence-based processes for

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action planning, consensus building.

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There's no reason that a really high caliber facilitator wouldn't have

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some type of training in that area.

Tammy Tilzey:

That's great.

Tammy Tilzey:

I am wondering at this point is with your experience, cuz you not only train on this

Tammy Tilzey:

and have all these great resources, but you do a lot of the strategic planning

Tammy Tilzey:

work together and I just wanna watch your work after hearing all these different

Tammy Tilzey:

techniques, I wanna see you in action.

Tammy Tilzey:

Do you have any just averages that you've seen in terms of.

Tammy Tilzey:

If you are a group of 10 or so how long, or, I know it probably depends,

Tammy Tilzey:

but what does it depend on and how much time should you give to this process?

Marie Palacios:

So it really depends on what's involved in the process.

Marie Palacios:

We, when we first started out, we were learning and we

Marie Palacios:

wanted to give people options.

Marie Palacios:

So we would say, here's your strategic planning retreat.

Marie Palacios:

Because everyone's asking, they call us up and say, we're having a board retreat.

Marie Palacios:

We want you to facilitate strategic planning.

Marie Palacios:

So many moons ago, we would go and we would do these goal setting.

Marie Palacios:

Just the basic knowledge and agreement on where we are.

Marie Palacios:

We would start to goal set in a particular area.

Marie Palacios:

We'd say afterschool program, and they'd say, we can do this.

Marie Palacios:

And someone would say no, we can't do that because, and we

Marie Palacios:

kept, it felt like a yo-yo.

Marie Palacios:

And it just kept going back and forth and it was then they would say, you know what?

Marie Palacios:

We're gonna do it at every month.

Marie Palacios:

Board meeting.

Marie Palacios:

You lose momentum that way.

Marie Palacios:

So we found that strategic plans fail for lots of different reasons.

Marie Palacios:

We have an entire article on that called Reasons, top Reasons Strategic Plans

Marie Palacios:

fail, encourage you to look at it.

Marie Palacios:

And we have looked at the reasons plans fail, right?

Marie Palacios:

People aren't in the room.

Marie Palacios:

Maybe it's it drawn out too long and we lose momentum and people say,

Marie Palacios:

but we need to finish this before we can get through and actually plan.

Marie Palacios:

I say, there is no better time to plan than now if you're in the middle

Marie Palacios:

of a sticky situation, a pandemic.

Marie Palacios:

That is your current reality.

Marie Palacios:

There's nothing wrong with your current reality.

Marie Palacios:

It just is what it is.

Marie Palacios:

We start our planning where we are, whether that is good, bad, or ugly.

Marie Palacios:

So our process that we work through with clients, we've rebuilt to include

Marie Palacios:

things that not all processes include.

Marie Palacios:

So ours includes a visioning session, so it's strategic thinking,

Marie Palacios:

which I'm actually teaching today on a webinar at 2:00 PM Eastern.

Marie Palacios:

So we're talking about how strategic thinking drives strategic planning.

Marie Palacios:

That strategic thinking is like that big picture, that visionary piece,

Marie Palacios:

that where do we wanna be the why?

Marie Palacios:

We do that in the form of the visioning session, and we review the organization's

Marie Palacios:

core, their vision and their mission

Marie Palacios:

. Then we move into the environmental scans.

Marie Palacios:

Where are we now?

Marie Palacios:

We used to tell clients, oh, if you can do that, then we'll come and plan.

Marie Palacios:

We learned if they weren't always equipped to do that, so now that's automatically

Marie Palacios:

a part of our standard process.

Marie Palacios:

We do visioning, we do the environmental scan.

Marie Palacios:

The third piece that we engage them in is stakeholder feedback.

Marie Palacios:

They may not have the budget to do a really comprehensive

Marie Palacios:

$30,000 market research.

Marie Palacios:

We, so we meet people where they are, our standard process, guides them

Marie Palacios:

through some important conversations with stakeholders, and then we

Marie Palacios:

facilitate a two eight hour day strategic planning retreat back to back.

Marie Palacios:

It's a hard ask.

Marie Palacios:

We have a whole fax on why we do that, but we have truly learned that it keeps

Marie Palacios:

the momentum, it keeps the focus, and by the end of that two day retreat,

Marie Palacios:

Within, we tell them five business days, but it's almost always within 24 hours

Marie Palacios:

they have their written hand in plan.

Marie Palacios:

So while our process is intense, it also gets you to that end product.

Marie Palacios:

And then we offer a follow-up support call within 30 days because they've

Marie Palacios:

had time to digest, re look at it and say, Ooh, we left something

Marie Palacios:

out, or we need to tweak something.

Marie Palacios:

So we provide support.

Marie Palacios:

We provide them a suite of tools and templates so that they

Marie Palacios:

don't have to create a common director's report reporting tool,

Marie Palacios:

all of those types of things.

Marie Palacios:

So we provide them with the things that we believe will position

Marie Palacios:

most nonprofits to be successful.

Marie Palacios:

And then we also send them a plan of these are additional ways we might support.

Marie Palacios:

One thing I don't see with other a lot of other groups is creating an annual

Marie Palacios:

operational plan to get groups started.

Marie Palacios:

So we have organizations contact is that completed a plan with someone

Marie Palacios:

else and they have those lovely, wonderfully crafted 1, 2, 3 year goals.

Marie Palacios:

They're like, where do we go from here?

Marie Palacios:

So we actually on the second day of the retreat, break down

Marie Palacios:

the first year into quarters.

Marie Palacios:

Break down each quarter into their accomplishments, and then we actually

Marie Palacios:

model a 90 day implementation plan and give them an editable edible PDF as part

Marie Palacios:

of their get started suite of documents so that everyone knows when they walk out

Marie Palacios:

of that two day retreat, not just where they're gonna be in three years, but

Marie Palacios:

where they're gonna be in three weeks.

Marie Palacios:

And we found that including the implementation model is one of the biggest

Marie Palacios:

contributors to success of our clients.

Tammy Tilzey:

I could see that.

Tammy Tilzey:

All of this is great and you feel so accomplished after you got it done,

Tammy Tilzey:

and then you wanna go on vacation.

Tammy Tilzey:

And, but continue that momentum and even if you do, have a little break.

Tammy Tilzey:

What is, what's next?

Tammy Tilzey:

What's first, what's, I love that.

Marie Palacios:

Even people agree on the goals.

Marie Palacios:

Agreeing on first steps can be challenging, so we just, after many

Marie Palacios:

years of doing it, realized if we can model it with them and they can actually

Marie Palacios:

create their 90 day implementation plan for the first quarter of their plan.

Marie Palacios:

We walk through it, we send them into small groups who's

Marie Palacios:

involved in this particular achievement, this particular goal.

Marie Palacios:

And then they come and report.

Marie Palacios:

We tweak it.

Marie Palacios:

We say, how might we adjust this?

Marie Palacios:

They've walked out actually doing it, and then they have that 30 day check-in.

Marie Palacios:

And then we've provided the tips and tools, and then we

Marie Palacios:

also have follow-up plans.

Marie Palacios:

We have a lot of clients that go ahead and book those for their

Marie Palacios:

annual accountability and review.

Marie Palacios:

But again, those are different questions you'll ask facilitators.

Marie Palacios:

We're seeing a lot of calls for RFPs and many of them are saying we want

Marie Palacios:

an operational plan because people are realizing the end goals are great,

Marie Palacios:

but we need some type of way to put it into action for that annual planning.

Tammy Tilzey:

Yeah.

Tammy Tilzey:

Cuz if you don't have the capability of doing that yourself and getting

Tammy Tilzey:

all that consensus on what we're gonna do first really again helps

Tammy Tilzey:

people exercise those newly formed muscles of what they just learned.

Tammy Tilzey:

So the environmental scan and the stakeholder input that happens

Tammy Tilzey:

before the two day separate.

Tammy Tilzey:

Okay.

Marie Palacios:

absolutely.

Marie Palacios:

We wanna make sure that they're taking into consideration information that could

Marie Palacios:

or should impact their future decisions.

Marie Palacios:

And we talk about stakeholders, anyone who has a vested interest

Marie Palacios:

in the organization, but there's lots of different ways to do that.

Marie Palacios:

We identify the stakeholders.

Marie Palacios:

We talk about what we need to, what we need to know from them.

Marie Palacios:

And most people say, but we wanna talk to everyone.

Marie Palacios:

It's not necessary to talk to everyone before the strategic plan retreats.

Marie Palacios:

Some of those conversations are needed to.

Marie Palacios:

Confirm the framework and the major directions others are gonna be.

Marie Palacios:

We need this feedback to implement this step really well.

Marie Palacios:

Like we want a membership program.

Marie Palacios:

What do people want in a membership program that would come after

Marie Palacios:

you've determined, we're doing X, Y, or Z, because you already

Marie Palacios:

know that's being requested.

Marie Palacios:

But you might send out a survey to all your stakeholders and say, what would you

Marie Palacios:

like to see enhanced in our membership program once the plan's approved?

Marie Palacios:

So you have to figure out what are the front end and what are

Marie Palacios:

the implementation and stakeholder conversations that to be had so you

Marie Palacios:

don't get overwhelmed in the process.

Tammy Tilzey:

Yeah.

Tammy Tilzey:

Yeah, I could see that.

Tammy Tilzey:

Oh my gosh, there's so much I wanna ask for.

Tammy Tilzey:

Stories of difficult situations, how you resolve 'em, all this.

Tammy Tilzey:

But as you're talking you keep on bringing up these resources that you have.

Tammy Tilzey:

And I know from working with you, the vault isn't

Tammy Tilzey:

something that you keep secret.

Tammy Tilzey:

The vault is something that you have full of resources that you offer.

Tammy Tilzey:

Folks.

Tammy Tilzey:

I first wanna give you a chance, is there anything really critical about

Tammy Tilzey:

strategic planning that you also wanna say as part of the element that I

Tammy Tilzey:

might not have asked you about yet?

Marie Palacios:

I think the getting the buy-in is really important because,

Marie Palacios:

we see staff calls and say, we've been charged to do this, or the board saying

Marie Palacios:

We're doing this without the staff, and that's like having your kites or

Marie Palacios:

your kite flyers in the room alone.

Marie Palacios:

It doesn't really work well.

Marie Palacios:

So we've actually.

Marie Palacios:

Turn down clients that are willing to book us because we did not feel

Marie Palacios:

like they were gonna be able to get the right people in the room.

Marie Palacios:

Like we don't have to have a hundred percent of board members or a

Marie Palacios:

hundred percent of staff, but you need that diversity of opinion.

Marie Palacios:

And we didn't wanna take their money and invest their time in a process

Marie Palacios:

that we did not feel was going to produce the best results for them.

Marie Palacios:

So I would say buy-in is very important and understanding that strategic planning

Marie Palacios:

is an investment that you should see a return on that investment in organization.

Marie Palacios:

We've had, I've checked in with three of our groups this week and.

Marie Palacios:

Just said, what's working well, and they said the way that we structured

Marie Palacios:

the plan, they use it every staff meeting, the implementation tools

Marie Palacios:

and you know that buy-in and that follow through is important.

Marie Palacios:

It is an investment.

Marie Palacios:

It's gonna take time and it does not need to take tons of time.

Marie Palacios:

It doesn't have to take years like some people think, or even a year

Marie Palacios:

time, and it could take money.

Marie Palacios:

So you need to be thinking about it before your next budgeting

Marie Palacios:

period and looking at prices.

Marie Palacios:

A lot of people call us and say, we wanna do this next week.

Marie Palacios:

Most facilitators will be booked out a little ways, and they wanna make

Marie Palacios:

sure that you've gotten the pre-work done before any planning retreats.

Marie Palacios:

So start early, even if you think it may be the end of next year, go

Marie Palacios:

ahead and start those conversations.

Marie Palacios:

Start getting potential prices.

Marie Palacios:

And start looking at your budgeting so that when it's time to engage

Marie Palacios:

in strategic planning, you have all of those ducks in a row and

Marie Palacios:

can make better informed decisions.

Tammy Tilzey:

Oh, that's great.

Tammy Tilzey:

That's great.

Tammy Tilzey:

So with your free resources, I know you train, you mentioned you have a

Tammy Tilzey:

training going on today about strategic thinking and can you explain what

Tammy Tilzey:

offerings you have and how your.

Tammy Tilzey:

Because I think you have a whole bootcamp on this.

Tammy Tilzey:

Who are you training potential facilitators or people that

Tammy Tilzey:

wanna do it on their own?

Tammy Tilzey:

Who do you train and who do you, you go out in the field and what

Tammy Tilzey:

kind of programs do you offer?

Tammy Tilzey:

If you could give us an overview of that.

Marie Palacios:

So we have our kind of what I call our good, better, best.

Marie Palacios:

Anything that's free and is accessible is good.

Marie Palacios:

When Mandy and I started, we had a commitment that we wanna

Marie Palacios:

have something for everyone, but we are a for-profit business.

Marie Palacios:

We actually feed our families with our income.

Marie Palacios:

So we wanted to make sure that we had really good options for people that just

Marie Palacios:

aren't at a point where they can invest.

Marie Palacios:

You can find those free options under the resource tab if you

Marie Palacios:

go to funding for good.org.

Marie Palacios:

And you look at the resource tab, you will see templates, you'll

Marie Palacios:

see some paid ones on there.

Marie Palacios:

I will tell you that those right underneath there are close

Marie Palacios:

to 50 free templates at any given time on that template.

Marie Palacios:

So if you need budgeting templates, if you need getting started, top

Marie Palacios:

questions to ask your board about strategic planning, those are on there.

Marie Palacios:

So we have an entire library of articles and video videos on

Marie Palacios:

strategic planning, board development, fundraising, all those things.

Marie Palacios:

So that's really good option for everyone.

Marie Palacios:

And then if you go to the training tab, we're always offering free

Marie Palacios:

trainings through our partners, such as Found It or, sometimes we're

Marie Palacios:

with grant station or small business development centers across the country.

Marie Palacios:

So you can look at those free trainings.

Marie Palacios:

We never click bait.

Marie Palacios:

You'll see free and large capital letters beside anything that's free.

Marie Palacios:

Anything that's not free, we then, we have our better, we have some paid trainings.

Marie Palacios:

They're usually about $47, and they're very specific topics.

Marie Palacios:

And the great thing about those is you do get the recordings, you get the handouts,

Marie Palacios:

you get all of those nifty tools always.

Marie Palacios:

We have editable templates or things in there as well, so that's a better option.

Marie Palacios:

And then we have the Vault, which is all of our digital resources under one roof.

Marie Palacios:

And it comes up to about, we say less than a hundred dollars a month, but it's a one

Marie Palacios:

time subscription for the year and has all the trainings, everything in there.

Marie Palacios:

As far as custom work, the best option.

Marie Palacios:

So we have good, then we have the better, a little bit more tailored

Marie Palacios:

to what you're looking for.

Marie Palacios:

You can get it on demand, and then the best option is that custom work.

Marie Palacios:

So we do work with clients to facilitate strategic planning and

Marie Palacios:

we're happy to share our approach.

Marie Palacios:

We can send that and say, here's how we work.

Marie Palacios:

It's all in writing.

Marie Palacios:

You can share it.

Marie Palacios:

We can share references.

Marie Palacios:

We work with consultants because we know that there's lots of amazing

Marie Palacios:

consultants out in the communities that are trying to grow their businesses.

Marie Palacios:

So we actually have bootcamps for consultants.

Marie Palacios:

Some of them are growing their strategic planning services, their

Marie Palacios:

grant writing services, fundraising services, and we do particular trainings.

Marie Palacios:

We've had a ton of free trainings for consultants.

Marie Palacios:

We have camps, and then we have a wonderful.

Marie Palacios:

Two day nonprofit consulting com conference coming up in August.

Marie Palacios:

That's specific to consultants.

Marie Palacios:

So if any of the audience is out there and they say, oh, we work, or we know

Marie Palacios:

some amazing consultants, the nonprofit consulting conference is an amazing way

Marie Palacios:

to get great information and network with people from all over the world.

Marie Palacios:

So those good, better, best.

Marie Palacios:

Check out the website, the free stuff, the paid stuff is always really reasonable.

Marie Palacios:

And then all the custom stuff we work with you to create something that's

Marie Palacios:

gonna get you to where you wanna be.

Tammy Tilzey:

Great.

Tammy Tilzey:

Great.

Tammy Tilzey:

This has been so helpful and I wanna thank you so much for sharing

Tammy Tilzey:

all of this with our community.

Tammy Tilzey:

This is a topic that can.

Tammy Tilzey:

Really make a difference for a nonprofit organization.

Tammy Tilzey:

But you're right the time is now to plan and budget and really do what you

Tammy Tilzey:

need and make sure that you have the resources and time set aside to do that.

Tammy Tilzey:

And so I'm.

Tammy Tilzey:

I've learned so much I'm sure our community has as well about the

Tammy Tilzey:

strategic planning process and how important it is for long-term success.

Tammy Tilzey:

I wanna remind our listeners that we will be including Marie's contact

Tammy Tilzey:

information as well as the funding for good website where you could learn

Tammy Tilzey:

more and where you could access these resources about environmental scan

Tammy Tilzey:

and the process of filling out rf.

Tammy Tilzey:

P and where that resource tab is, we'll provide you a nice link and I really.

Tammy Tilzey:

I really appreciate how open you are and not that scarcity mindset.

Tammy Tilzey:

The, we have sponsored and worked with funding for good on your nonprofit

Tammy Tilzey:

consulting conference last year, and we're happy to do that again this year.

Tammy Tilzey:

And so really encourage any consultants or.

Tammy Tilzey:

People thinking about being a consultant to check that out, heard just rave

Tammy Tilzey:

reviews from people who did go to that.

Tammy Tilzey:

So we appreciate you taking the time outta your busy schedule to join us.

Tammy Tilzey:

Do you have any final thoughts or advice to leave our listeners with?

Marie Palacios:

No, just, get, start looking around at the

Marie Palacios:

strategic planning processes.

Marie Palacios:

Again, go to the website, strategic Planning Services.

Marie Palacios:

We have a free checklist to get started in the strategic planning process.

Marie Palacios:

You can go to, Funding for good.

Marie Palacios:

Look at the strategic planning tab.

Marie Palacios:

There's a free editable checklist as well.

Marie Palacios:

Again, there's no shortage of resources.

Marie Palacios:

So start the conversations and if you're not where, sure where to start, but

Marie Palacios:

you think you might wanna be moving forward and needing a consultant,

Marie Palacios:

you can always schedule a call.

Marie Palacios:

Tammy's gonna share the links and all of those good things and it's on the website,

Marie Palacios:

but we look forward to seeing, hopefully you all on other found events, maybe

Marie Palacios:

at the nonprofit conference or online.

Marie Palacios:

We're in person soon.

Marie Palacios:

So thanks for having me today, Tammy.

Marie Palacios:

It's been a lot of fun to connect with you.

Marie Palacios:

It's always great to see you.

Tammy Tilzey:

Same to you.

Tammy Tilzey:

If you have learned something from today's Connected Philanthropy podcast,

Tammy Tilzey:

please share it with others who might also enjoy and benefit from it.

Tammy Tilzey:

Maria and Mandy, you have so much available and we're so glad to be part

Tammy Tilzey:

of sharing that out, and we look forward to connecting with our community and

Tammy Tilzey:

also with you, Mandy and future webinars, podcasts, and community discussions.

Tammy Tilzey:

We will include all those links in the show notes and we

Tammy Tilzey:

wish you all the best success.

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