Business Development Framework With Strategy Map 1v6oe

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STRATEGIC ACTION PLAN: ALPHA DRAFT [ADD A PICTURE]

GREENE COUNTY NETWORK APRIL, 2009

C i t y, S t a t e • Te l e p h o n e : 1 2 3 . 4 5 6 . 7 8 9 0 • w w w. y o u r o r g a n i z a t i o n . n e t

Greene County Network Our Purpose The Greene County Network aligns and leverages economic development resources to promote the prosperity for the people and businesses in Greene County, Indiana. We seek individually and collectively to transform our county by focusing on collaborations that encourages productive investment in a dynamic, sustainable economy that protects and promotes the rural character of our county.

Our Vision The Greene County Network will become a a nationally recognized rural collaboration to promote new approaches to economic development. These new approaches foster entrepreneurship, sustainable development practices, a commitment to long-term investment, and a focus on our next generation. We strive to be a collaboration committed to learning, measuring and improving our performance at every level. We will continuously evaluate our progress in achieving our vision through a range of regular evaluations by our stakeholders and comparisons with leading edge rural communities.

Our Values As a network of Greene County leaders dedicated to civic leadership, we hold ourselves able for practicing our values of •

integrity and respect;

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personal responsibility and mentorship;

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innovation and entrepreneurship;

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partnership and civic leadership;

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efficiency and effectiveness; and

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continuous learning and improvement.

Our Strategic Framework Our strategy follows the framework

The Strategy Base Map for Open Source Economic Development

of Open Source Economic Development developed at the Purdue Center for Regional Development. This

Brainpower 21 Century Talent

Innovation Entrepreneurship Networks

framework provides clear “strategy maps” for our network to follow in deg and implementing our activities.

Civic Collaboration

The Open Source model outlines that any globally competitive economy must manage collaborations

Quality, Connected Places

Branding Experiences

and investments in five areas: •Building world-class brainpower

Invest in world class brainpower with 21st century skills Convert brainpower into wealth through innovation and entrepreneurship networks Create powerful stories and branding experiences to communicate a new path forward

•Translating brainpower into wealth through entrepreneurship and innovation networks •Holding wealth in the region by

Develop quality, connected places and innovation "hot spots"

developing quality, connected places

Strengthen leadership skills and civic disciplines of collaboration to develop and implement "link and leverage" strategies

•Creating a deep sense of commu-

Source: Ed Morrison, distributed under a Creative Commons 3.0 Attribution License

nity identify expressed through an effective brand

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Promoting strong habits of civic collaboration to spot opportunities, align resources and resolve disputes

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Our Strategic Focus Areas We cannot accomplish everything all at once. We must choose our areas of focus carefully. At the same time, we recognize the lessons that Open Source Economic Development teaches: Prosperity will flow to communities and regions that follow a balanced strategy of investments: in talent, businesses, physical development, promotion and leadership. To begin, we have chosen to promote the development of Home Town Competitiveness, as well as a handful of other initiatives initiatives that focus on: •

engaging civic leaders and practicing new skills of collaboration through our Greene County Network

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promoting youth development

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ing entrepreneurs

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engaging our charitable assets to expand productive investments in our county

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emphasizing quality, connected physical development that preserves and promotes the rural character of our county

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build the new story of Greene County by providing engaging and fun experiences through festivals and other activities.

Our Commitment to Home Town

• • • •

Leadership

Youth

Charitable Assets

Entrepreneurship

The Four Pillars of Hometown Competitiveness

Mobilize Local Leaders Energize Entrepreneurs Engage Young People Cultivate Charitable Assets to these community building efforts.

Competitiveness Home Town Competitiveness provides a practical model for Greene County to follow. It is not, by itself, a complete strategy. At the same time, it focuses our leadership’s attention of critical opportunities for us to pursue. The strategy model of Home Town Competitive-

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ness represents four pillars: Entrepreneurship, Charitable Assets, Youth and Leadership. We have launched initiatives (projects) in these areas, and we will continue them in the coming year.

Other Initiatives to Complement Home Town Competitiveness A range of other activities are underway in Greene County that will have major impacts on our future prosperity. These initiatives include land use and zoning, large scale infrastructure investments, and the successful promotion of our county through engaging and innovative festivals. That is not a complete list. We have other activities as well that are making significant contributions to the future prospects for our county.

Mapping Our Initiatives on Our Strategy Map We need help in keeping track of all these activities so that we can align them. Through “link and leverage” strategies, individuals and organizations can accomplish far more working together than they can working separately. Each of these activities represents a network of citizens within the county focused on a particular dimension of our development. Very quickly, we can lose track. That’s where a Strategy Map can help. We all know the adage, “A picture is worth a thousand words.” In putting our county on a sustainable path to development, we need first to “see” what others are doing. The strategy map developed at the Purdue Center for Regional Development represents a simple tool to help us “see” the networks that form around different projects. When we begin to see these networks, and -- more important -- begin to link these networks together, we start down a path of aligning, linking and leveraging our assets in new and different ways.

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• • • •

Leadership

Youth

Charitable Assets

Entrepreneurship

The Four Pillars of Hometown Competitiveness

Mobilize Local Leaders Energize Entrepreneurs Engage Young People Cultivate Charitable Assets to these community building efforts.

We can map Hometown Competitiveness on to the Strategy Base Map of Open Source Economic Development

Brainpower 21 Century Talent

Innovation Entrepreneurship Networks

Youth

Entrepreneurship

Charitable Assets Leadership Civic Collaboration

We can also map other initiatives underway in Greene County. By putting all these initiatives on one map, we can keep track of them. More important, we can see connections among them.

Land use and zoning Infrastructure Quality, Connected Places

Festivals Branding Experiences

Putting it all Together: Developing the Habits of Strategic Doing Pulling a strategy together is no longer an event; it is a continuous process. Most of us learned the disciplines of strategic planning, an industrial age set of practices that works when the world is relatively stable, and command-and-control organizations dominate the landscape. That is not the world in which we now live. Change is turbulent, and to be effective in economic development, we must rely on consensus and alignments. Open networks -not stiff hierarchies -- dominate. In a word, no one can really tell anyone else what to do. Yet, we must undertake some very complex projects to build Greene County in this open environment. We undertake these projects in a “civic space” outside the four walls of any one organization. Coordinating festival promotions, strengthening entrepreneurship networks, managing land use, implementing effective youth initiatives: none of Yo u r O r g a n i z a t i o n

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these projects are easy. At the same time, we cannot do everything, and we want to focus our efforts on initiatives that matter. In short, we need to think and act strategically. Strategic Doing is a set of practices developed at the Purdue Center for Regional Development to meet the challenges of deg and implementing strategy in an open environment. There are three components to Strategic Doing: Strategy Maps.-- Keeping track of a strategy requires visual tools. The Strategy

•

Map we have introduced earlier provides the basic tool for keeping track of who is doing what and how different projects connect (or don’t). Disciplined Conversations.-- We need to learn to manage our conversations.

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The reason is simple. We have a limited time together in the “civic space”. We need to use this time wisely. Strategic Doing teaches us that four questions are critically important: 1. What could we do together? We must continuously explore the connections among our assets and initiatives. By spending time on this question, we open ourselves to the possiStrategic Doing guides conversations

bilities for “linking and leverag-

What could we do together?

ing” our assets together.

Find

2.What should we do together? We need to focus our attention How will we learn together?

Learn

Focus

What should we do together?

on a handful of priorities. In order to develop enduring partnerships, we need a clear view of the outcomes toward which

Execute

we are working. Without a clear

What will we do together?

understanding of our outcome, our collaborations can quickly break apart at the first sign of difficulty. In contrast, if we have a deep understanding of where we are heading, our partnerships are far more durable. Yo u r O r g a n i z a t i o n

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3. What will we do together? We can only accomplish complex projects if we each contribute something. Gone are the days when civic leaders could come up with ideas and expect someone else to “do the work”. This question insures that we re clear about the tasks ahead and who is committed to completing them. 4. How will we learn together? Strategy is a process, not an event. It requires continuous adjustments as circumstances change. So the last key question of strategic doing develops a clear understanding of how we will come together again to evaluate our progress. •

Commitment to a Process.-- Complex projects take time to complete. They require a clear, simple and continuous process of evaluation and readjustment. These Strategic Doing gatherings (or forums) should be conducted every 30, 60 or 90 days. Each gathering can be short -- from 1 to 3 hours is enough to review a strategy and make adjustments.

Keeping it all Together: Managing Our Projects in an Open Network We will organize our projects within the Network with a flexible structure, one that can accommodate both focus and flexibility. The Network is not designed to take over the responsibilities of any individual organization. Rather, the Network connects these organizations into a larger, easy-to-understand pattern.

Our Initiatives for 2009 For 2009, we are focused on the following transformational initiatives: •

Initiative 1

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Initiative 2

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Initiative 3

We will add transformational initiatives from time to time. Yo u r O r g a n i z a t i o n

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Managing Our Strategic Activities The Network Core Team.-- Our Network’s core team is committed to carrying forward this process. The core team consists of leaders of civic organizations -- business, government and non-profits -- committed to working together for the future of Greene County. We will start with a relatively small core of individuals, and we are committed to expanding this circle with people who share the commitment to work together and contribute their assets, networks and resources to a shared future. The Role of the Professional Staff.-- The professional staff of our civic organizations are individuals best in the position to guide this network. They have the skills, networks, and experience to guide the network. At the same time, they cannot do the work of the Network. That is a responsibility that must be more broadly shared.

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