BNDP Designing Strategy Extension Toolkits

Thank you for continuing to invest in this process!

Bridgespan has designed four extension toolkits to help your team take important next steps to further refine and “live into” your intended impact and theory of change after completing the Designing Strategy program. You can learn more about each toolkit by viewing its overview video below.

Introduction

Each of the toolkits includes guidance on how to tackle immediate next steps, including individual and optional group activities, supporting templates, and examples.

We recommend identifying a “Toolkit Lead” to guide this additional process. The activities can typically be completed individually by the Toolkit Lead, but we also provide options for engaging the broader team and strongly suggest specific occasions to do so.

Provided toolkits include:

Crafting a learning plan
Planning for stakeholder engagement
Developing decision criteria
Bridging to strategic planning

If you have any questions about these toolkits or suggestions on how they can be improved, please reach out to the Bridgespan Coaching team at [email protected].

Many organizations need to conduct research to address critical open questions related to their intended impact and theory of change. Planning how you will learn what is needed to answer your priority questions is a wise investment in ensuring there is a clear roadmap—with activities and owners—for strengthening your drafts.

Using this toolkit you’ll develop a learning plan to address your prioritized open questions, with clear learning activities, owners, and related timelines.

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A relatively small group has been involved in your strategy process to date as a part of the Achieving Strategic Clarity program. Intentionally engaging stakeholders will allow you to build broader buy-in and gather critical feedback so you can strengthen and gain confidence in your intended impact and theory of change.

Using this toolkit you’ll develop a plan for communicating with and engaging different stakeholders. This plan will include: clear objectives, key messages and a defined format, owner, and timeline for engaging each stakeholder group.

Download the Toolkit

Decision criteria provide a concrete -- and explicit -- way to keep your intended impact and theory of change a living tool and help your team hold itself accountable to the strategy you've set. You can use these criteria when you are looking at new opportunities, as well as when you are periodically reviewing your current work.

Using this toolkit you will develop a set of criteria anchored to your intended impact and theory of change that can be used to assess new opportunities and review your current work.

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Your intended impact and theory of change should inform the focus of your organization’s work. Whether you have an existing strategic plan or are preparing to launch one in the near-term, you will want to ensure it fully reflects your intended impact and theory of change, as this strategic clarity will ground many of your decisions as an organization.

In this toolkit, you’ll learn about Bridgespan’s perspective on what effective strategic planning takes, and ways you can build on the work in the Achieving Strategic Clarity program to launch a broader planning process.

Download the Toolkit

BNDP Designing Strategy Extension Toolkits

Introduction

Crafting a Learning Plan Toolkit

Planning for Stakeholder Engagement Toolkit

Developing Decision Criteria Toolkit

Bridging to Strategic Planning Toolkit