Be Honest About What Your True Purposes Are. For Example:
	Do you want a plan because everybody else has one?
	Do you have a clear mission and need to develop goals that move toward it – or do you have a number of goals which actually point to different missions?
	Do you have a thousand projects going on so that you aren’t sure what the goals should be any more?
	Is everyone involved in the organization basically on board together, or do you need more cohesion to be effective?
	Do you need to plan because your goals are out of date, or your situation has changed?

Who?
Some organizations choose to involve as many people as possible in the planning process as a whole. There are merits to bringing a large group together to have input and work through possibilities, but generally a smaller group is needed to pin things down and decide exactly who does what when.

Depending on your organizational culture, you may want to do a series of meetings with different constituencies before a decision-making retreat. Often much is learned by bringing in customers and collaborators.

No matter how you decide to go about it, you will need a small group (5-7 is good) to guide the planning process.

What?
While management or the Board are probably the ones who will decide what gets done during the planning process, broad consultation will serve you well. You can learn a lot by asking rank and file employees and customers what the important issues are.


How?
An in-house planning facilitator has the advantage of knowing the systems and how they work. An in-house planning facilitator has the disadvantage of knowing the systems and how they work. Think carefully before you decide that you want an insider in this key role.

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