As a business owner or manager, you undoubtedly already know the frustrating statistics surrounding new business longevity. Or lack thereof. Many small businesses won't make it past the first year and the majority of all businesses won't make it past the first five years. Why? Because starting up and running a business is difficult. No matter what industry you are in. The good news is that the right strategic planning software can help you on your journey.

Strategic software is so important and so vital to the modern business precisely because so many new businesses flounder due to their inability to properly assess and plan for market changes, disruptions, and more. Just consider the following key common business mistakes that can be avoided by simply including the right strategy execution software:

• Using current situations as a basis for future limitations. It is so common for new business owners and entrepreneurs to see their current situation and make plans for that current situation to always exist. However, the businesses that succeed are most often those who don't see their current limitations as limitations. They plan for the long-term. New people, new business plans, new markets all can assist one in overcoming existing limitations. With strategic planning systems, teams and businesses can better plan for the future while not staying trapped in the present mentality. 
• Too many goals in too short of time. It is good to have goals, but there is such a thing as too much of a good thing. Having too many goals means you will often have competing or contradicting goals, and the limited time window can mean that you spread your team and your business too thin. The good news is that a strategic planning app or program can help with the planning goals phase as well as goal tracking. This works to ensure a business makes smart goal-making decisions and has the features to make tracking and performance analysis on those goals easy. 
• Not measuring performance. This is a big one. So many new businesses falter because they never take the time to measure any of their progress. The business instead is too focused on staying afloat and reacting to things in the present but not looking to make changes to take present realities to future possibilities. Great strategic planning software includes key performance tools like metrics to analyze KPIs and assist a business to build OKRs that seamlessly integrate performance measurements. 

Communicate and Cascade Strategy

The core issue that's at the heart of all the above common problems and more is poor communication. Good communication is the heartbeat of any company of any size of any industry. Just consider how many times you have to communicate something about a project to someone else; how often what you do relies on the information your team gives you. Thus it is integral for every company to have the communication in place to properly cascade strategy. One of the best ways of doing so is by evaluating a list of the best strategic planning tools and implementing the strategic planning software that makes sense for your business. 

The best strategic planning happens when the facts of your company’s performance are properly brought forth, benefits outlined, challenges discussed, and then teams act and react accordingly. Strong strategic planning applications are designed to make communicating all across an organization easy and stress-free. The best strategic planning tools do this by:

• Organizing all data in a single place. Instead of running around, making constant calls, or insisting on hourly email updates, strategic planning applications start with improving communication across the board by putting everything in one platform. 
• Easy visualization of communication and strategic plans. In addition to putting data in one place, the best strategic planning tools feature integrated visualization features. For example, team members can easily publish study trends via line charts or pie charts that make data easier to read and improve communication about a specific subject. Being able to easily use tools to transform static data into appealing visuals is important no matter what industry your business is. That's because things like graphs, bullet-point lists, and PowerPoint presentations have repeatedly been shown to enhance communication and improve memory retention. Both of these improve overall employee productivity which contributes to more effective business protocols. 
• Integrated tracking and reporting tools. Strategic Planning software incorporates actionable dashboards where users can easily track trends and events. This is ideal for companies who are using OKRs and KPIs who need a central place to both publish their goals and methodologies for obtaining them as well as a place to track how the team and company are progressing towards those goals or objectives. 

Features You Need in Dynamic Strategic Planning Solutions

As you start shopping for strategic planning solutions and initiative management software, you are going to find a lot out on the market. Simply note that not every strategy management software is built the same. While our experience has led to us incorporating many of the main features in Elate, including the very sought-after one-page strategic plan template that helps businesses with strategic planning from the ground up, there are some really great options out there.

But no matter which strategic planning software you choose for your company, make sure they can offer you the following key features:

• Custom goal setting with scenario planning. Remember, one of the biggest mistakes new businesses make is thinking current limitations are always limitations. Having strategic planning solutions that allow you to consider and anticipate various business scenarios and in doing so, will your team overcome that known hurdle. Good software solutions for this will also include the capability to create unique goals defined by your own criteria. 
• Chart, graph, and diagram templates that are easy to use. This is another thing we discussed above as it is one of the very unique and yet integral aspects of any initiative management software. In fact, if there is one thing to choose one product over another on, this is it. That's because using the right charts and being able to have team members who aren't that tech-savvy easily put their information into user-intuitive graphs and charts is invaluable. These visualizations are an incredible way to get hard data across and help propel the business forward. 
• Historical data aggregation. Software solutions are great because they can easily automate and aggregate data within just a few clicks of a button. complete data analysis in seconds what used to take weeks of study. Our own strategic planning software at Elate is proud to include tools that make it easy to collect and track both KPI and OKR metrics.
• Process and performance monitoring. All types of strategy execution management software should include monitoring features. After all, one of the primary goals of this type of software is to make strategic planning by businesses easier, more efficient, and ultimately more productive and the best way to do all of that is with proper monitoring features. Monitoring features make it possible to track where one is on any series of goals or objectives and it can help track how previous tasks were at achieving said goals and objectives. 
• Budgeting and forecasting. Not every software of this type on the market includes this, but the great ones do. Having everything incorporated in one software package further helps to keep business data organized. 
• Predictive models and simulations. Custom model creation is something you will find in more advanced strategic planning software like ours at Elate. Just as it is important to create static visualizations like charts and diagrams, so too is it important to create simulations and modeling. Predictive models and simulations allow businesses to simulate different potential strategies. You can also add in different variables and see for yourself what your business might expect. 

Choose the Best Strategic Planning Software: Choose Elate

Here at Elate, our developers and team members have had the exact same struggles and frustrations many businesses have when starting a new venture. In fact, it is because of our experiences that we combined talents to create a robust, multi-purposeful platform through which other businesses can better succeed. 

Through our best strategic planning software, businesses can:

• Easily and beautifully set out a company vision and goals. Our gorgeous, user-intuitive software has been designed to make it easy for managers and teams to set and create goals. From the very first page, set the system to display your company vision and upcoming objectives. 
• Drive more efficient teamwork with transparency. Remember, cascading communication is key to business success and efficiency. Elate's strategic planning dashboard makes it easy to cascade objectives throughout your business's various teams and departments. This streamlines communication and enables effective collaboration between departments and even individuals within those departments. 
• Better track performance. Dashboard tools make it easy to first plan out objectives but then also, even more importantly, follow up on how those objectives are being met. Users can set up notifications and alerts as key reminders for team members to check-in, input present data, and see how well objectives are being met. Or simply how much progress is being met. This consistent tracking of performance helps prevent teams from getting sidetracked. 
• Prioritize business strategy and leadership meetings. The Elate dashboard was built primarily as software to track strategic planning. As such, we put in a lot of features that make it possible to build up executive scorecards and improve both business meetings and overall business goals. 

So are you ready to see the difference that a robust strategic planning software can have on your business and goals? Let our team be the one to show you that difference. Contact us today to learn how to set up your business for success with this program. 

Over the past few years, we've seen an evolution of the strategy and operations leader at high growth companies. What was traditionally viewed as a leadership role designed simply to help add structure and processes, strategy and operations leaders are now taking a much more direct role in driving growth at leading companies.

Today, strategy and operations leaders serve as the connective tissue between the long-term vision of the company and the tactical execution. Often, they sit directly alongside the CEO or leadership team, and help translate the three, five, and ten-year vision into quarterly goals that must be reached in order to ever realize that long-term vision. 

So with the increased emphasis placed on the strategy and operations position within a high growth company, it's more important than ever that these leaders are leveraging solutions that help drive execution towards the company's vision. One critical part of executing towards a long-term vision is the Strategic Planning process. At Elate, we believe Strategic Planning is all about the people, process, and tools a company needs to continue meeting milestones on their path to success. 

With Strategic Planning serving as a catalyst for growth at so many high growth companies, strategy and operations leaders need a solution that unifies the entirety of their Strategic Planning process. From building their plan, to executing against it, and reviewing performance, the right strategic software can create a complete lifecycle that accelerates growth for a business. 

In the past, strategy and operations leaders were forced to use tools that were incredibly manual or only provided visibility into one part of their Strategic Planning process. Whether it was in the form of excel spreadsheets, balanced scorecard software, scenario planning software, performance management tools, or even just dashboards, each of these examples comes with significant manual effort to set up and provides limited visibility into the entirety of the Strategic Planning process. 

So for those looking for a Strategic Planning software to help align your team like never before, transparently execute on what is most important, and easily review performance for future goals, we'd like to introduce you to Elate. 

Elate is the leading Strategic Planning software built to help high growth companies communicate their vision, create alignment, and track performance all in one place.

Unlike free strategic planning software or manual tools like excel, slides, or OKR tools, Elate was built to fill the void of Strategic Planning solutions in the market. From our own experience in strategy and operations at high growth companies, our team built Elate serve as a solution that provides leaders with insights across the business and drives decision-making at every level of the company. 

Today, we'd like to share what Strategic Planning software really is, how it helps in building strategic planning templates, and why Strategic Planning for SaaS companies can serve as a competitive advantage.  Let's start with understanding what we mean when we say 'Strategic Planning Software.' 

What is Strategic Planning Software 

If you were to look at the definition of Strategic Planning software from a few different sources, here is what you might find: 

G2: Strategic planning software provides a solution for building out a business mission statement, a plan to accomplish the mission, and the ability to track progress toward that ultimate business goal. Strategic planning solutions give users a place to easily create and share company values and goals, as well as track key performance indicators necessary to accomplishing those goals.

Capterra: Strategic planning software gives companies a centralized place to define business performance objectives, collect data, track progress, analyze trends, and predict outcomes.

The reality is that nothing in these definitions is wrong. In fact, tactically, they encompass a good portion of what should be part of any strategy and operations leader's search for strategic management software. 

However, too often when searching for software to help solve strategic execution management we get fixated on a single pain we are looking to solve for our company. Examples such as, 'Our employees aren't updating objectives. We need something to make this easier' or 'We are constantly losing sight of priorities as an executive team, so we need to implement business execution software to stay on track.’

While those are certainly real pains that can cause significant harm within a business, the reality is that you are likely just playing 'whack-a-mole' trying to solve for the most immediate pain for today without understanding the underlying issue.

In defining 'What is Strategic Planning Software', we must understand how it fits into the entirety of the business. 

Strategic Planning software should help create the rhythm and cadence for your business, while providing a solution to support the operating framework that you've chosen to implement at your company. We like to think of this in three parts: Plan, Execute, Review. 

However, it's important to remember these aren't simply tasks to be completed. As in, it isn't a point A to Z journey. Instead, think of Strategic Planning as an ever-evolving process or a flywheel. Additionally, Strategic Planning software should be the motor that helps keep the flywheel spinning, and even accelerate it at the appropriate times. 

Strategic Planning software isn't a point solution designed to help fix one issue within your company. Instead, company adoption, alignment, collaboration, and visibility are all benefits that come from implementing the right strategy execution management software. 

So don't get fixated on just solving for one of the challenges highlighted above, but rather on finding a solution that powers each step of the process. To do so, we've outlined the makings of any great Strategic Planning template to get you started. 

Strategic Plan Template 

When setting off to build your company's Strategic Plan, it always helps to have a template or structure to provide direction. Let's start by talking about the big picture. 

Whether this is your first Strategic Planning session or one of countless, it's always good to start with revisiting the three, five, and ten-year vision for the company. Aligning all your team members on the direction or even challenging the direction itself based on pivots, market changes, etc., is the perfect way to make sure you are all aligned and building goals off of the same expectations. So be able to answer the following: 

Three-Year Vision: 

3-5 Significant Milestones to Achieve:

Five-Year Vision: 

3-5 Significant Milestones to Achieve:

Ten-Year Vision: 

3-5 Significant Milestones to Achieve:

Next, let's focus on what will be the main priorities or themes for the company this year? Your strategic plan template should begin with 3-5 Themes that help define success for the company. 

These can often be sales, customer success, new product, or even culture-driven themes. For instance, one example of a sales theme could be: 

'Reach $100M in ARR on our way towards becoming a $1B Strategic Planning platform, powering the growth of 100,000+ businesses.'

As you can see, it isn't just a specific metric. It is a company objective with a key measurable that connects to the 'why' of the overall direction of the company. 

Finally, after building your company themes for the year in your strategic plan template, we can move on to how we will break those themes into quarterly goals. Again, these quarterly goals and objectives should connect. First to the annual theme, then to the long-term company vision. 

For tracking these quarterly objectives, you should be able to leverage your Strategic Planning software, rather than just any of the countless free strategic plan tracking tools. There are too many tracking tools to count, but don’t fall into the trap. The idea isn’t that you are just tracking updates with no context, but rather that you are connecting the progress and performance quarterly objectives and with the larger picture. By connecting these results, you can begin leveraging the insights for how you review past performance and build future objectives as a company. 

Strategic Planning SaaS 

For those in SaaS, Strategic Planning can be a touchy subject. Often we hear the excuse, 'We're just growing too fast. Strategic Planning doesn't work for us.' Or even worse, 'We just take things month-by-month or quarter-by-quarter, because we are still figuring things out.' 

Look, we get it. As a SaaS-based company, we understand the pace and degree of change that can come in our industry. However, by not providing clear direction on the long-term vision of the company, you are opening your company up to a lack of alignment, buy-in, or understanding of what should be prioritized. 

The best strategy and operations leaders we work with know that Strategic Planning is a constantly evolving process. Strategic Planning SaaS leaders embrace evolution. Rather than constantly fighting against structure or change, they are willing to ride the momentum and current needs of their company. 

This is why it's so important to fight against the software strategy examples so often given as to why strategic planning won't work for high growth SaaS companies. 

Strategic Planning can serve as a way to keep employees focused on priorities, while also providing them room for innovation. Ideas and innovation are never lacking at a high growth SaaS company, but ideas without direction will distract from the overall purpose. 

A great Strategic Planning software, like Elate, is designed to provide flexibility and account for the dynamic nature of high growth companies by providing a cadence and rhythm for bringing ideas and potential changes to a unified source. Strategic planning platforms help provide the proper forum for discussions and debate, while not throwing off the company's momentum. 

So as you think about whether Strategic Planning is right for your company, think about what you are losing every day by not harnessing the direction and creativity of every member of your organization. 

Best Strategic Planning Software 

As you might have picked up, we're a little biased here at Elate on the Best Strategic Planning Software. But can you blame us? 

Our founding team lived through the pain of using so-called Strategic Planning apps, that never amounted to anything more than an employee check-in tool or a static plan on a page tool that never provided the value or visibility needed to truly implement a plan and execute against it. Again, we realize that there are a number of low-cost options or even Strategic Planning Software free choices that exist. 

But don't be fooled! 

If you are looking for a solution to help maximize Strategic Planning at your company, make sure you are selecting a solution that allows for the following: 

- Connects the long-term vision of the company with tactical execution

- Creates clarity on where the company is going, and how they will get there 

- Provides an operating framework for how the company sets, plans, reviews, and takes action on the priorities moving the business forward 

As the leading Strategic Planning software built to help high growth companies communicate their vision, create alignment, and track performance all in one place, we are here to help. If you're interested in connecting with a member of our team to learn more about how Elate can help your business, reach out and someone will be in touch today!