Make it visible

Make your plan easily available via your library’s website, and include at least one or two highlighted points from the plan in every printed newsletter, press release, or other external communications.

Progress reports and reviews of your goals at monthly board meetings should be built into the agenda as standing items. You don’t have to spend a lot of time on them, but putting them on the agenda ensures that attention is paid to them.

Departments need to know what is being done by other departments. Just as it is important to have the greatest possible employee involvement in the creation of the strategic plan, it’s critical to ensure the greatest possible employee involvement in implementing every part of the plan.

The board should invite department heads to report regularly on progress towards achieving goals, celebrate accomplishments, and encourage continued action as needed.

Work for widespread buy-in

No plan will have complete, 100% buy-in by all parties. Some staff, and even some in your user community, may be less than enthusiastic about your goals. Nevertheless, you want people sufficiently involved that they understand where you’re headed, what you’re trying to accomplish, and how you plan to reach your stated goals. It is important to have buy-in from the people you need to help you achieve those goals. You want to leverage the principal of critical mass – getting enough people on board to bring the rest along. Buy-in is the recognition that your plan makes sense, and that every person has an important role to play in its success.

Encourage ownership and accountability for implementation of the strategic plan

When people begin to buy in, they start looking for ways to become involved.

They will look for pieces of the strategic plan they can own. This is an important

key to success in plan implementation. There should be one primary owner for each strategic goal, one person who will shepherd the goal to fruition, who will follow through, who will keep it alive, who will deal with the roadblocks and slowdowns.  Getting others engaged is part of the owner’s leadership role. Help people answer the question, “What’s in it for me?”

Capitalize on the energy created by successes

Success can be infectious.  Success creates positive energy, and energy results in momentum for the organization. Small successes build on each other, and the result is enough energy to power a plan to overall completion.