Strategic Plan Assessment Checklist

Strategic plans can be a vital tool for aligning and guiding all the activities in an organization. But they often
fall short in some ways. Here is a checklist of questions that can be applied to any published strategic plan,
to determine how effective it is likely to be; how well its accomplishments can be tracked, and how well it
may serve as an employee communication tool.

Does the plan clearly define who the primary customer is, and what they value most?

Does the mission statement focus on results for this customer, or is it just a list of everything the
organization does?

Does the plan paint a detailed vision (“picture of the future”), or is there just a brief vision statement?

Is the time horizon for the vision specified?

Does the plan describe strategies for achieving mission outcomes, or does it merely describe operational
plans?

How many high-level themes are listed? How many initiatives? How many pages are in the whole plan?

Are all goals/objectives based on strategies? Or are they projects, action items and initiatives?

Are outcomes or results defined? Does the plan distinguish between outputs and outcomes?

Are performance measures included?

Evaluate the performance measures on these features:

Measures have owners
Balanced mix of measures across perspectives
Transparent (obvious meaning or clearly defined composite measures)
Ratios where appropriate, rather than “number of”
Standardized for comparison with benchmarks
Quantitative balanced with qualitative
Consistent across time
Results-oriented rather than just operational or tactical
Measures tied to strategic objectives, not just initiatives (projects)
Practical, cost-effective
Frequency of collection appropriate to the dynamics of the process
Data actually being collected; named persons responsible for reporting

Are targets included? How are they calculated?

When will the performance measures be evaluated by senior management? When will the plan be
evaluated for revision?

Does the plan claim to follow the balanced scorecard framework? If so, how closely does it actually fit?

© 2006 Balanced Scorecard Institute 1