5 Ways to be Strategic in Chaos

I recently came across a story on Inc.com titled: The 6 Habits of True Strategic Thinkers. Written by Paul J. H. Shoemaker, the article got me thinking about my time in corporate public relations. I have never struggled more with making time for long-term planning than when I was director of public relations for a large hospital system. My days were jammed with pressing issues. Between phone calls, emails, meetings, media requests, and matters with patients - there was little time to plan for the future. While the story aptly covered the habits of strategic thinkers, I would add an addendum - how strategic thinkers get strategy done. Here are my top five ways to stay ahead of the game.

1. Schedule time on your calendar once a quarter to leave the office and work on your long-term plan. The key phrase is leave the office. The harder you are to find, the more you'll get done.

2. Create a status report so that you may track progress in writing. This is a basic document which can be easily created. Include tactics, people responsible, dates, progress. Commit to updating it every week - this will keep you accountable.

3. Formulate a network of others who are in similar positions at non-competing companies. Discuss your plans with them and they will help you identify strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats, etc.

4. Keep the plan in plain site. Squirreling it away just gives you an excuse to avoid it.

5. Protect your time and question busy work that comes your way. For example, one of the best ways to free up your time is to scrutinize your calendar. If someone requests a one-on-one meeting, see if you can handle their request with a phone call. Handle as much as you can via email and remember - people pay you to get things done, not necessarily do them. Delegate as much as you can.

Being strategic is more than keeping your head above water, it's changing the way you work so that you can achieve long-term goals while improving your efficiency and hopefully, your company's bottom line.

The Eggs, The Basket and Public Relations

You've heard the phrase - don't put all your eggs in one basket. Obviously, its good sense to diversify and protect what is yours. The concept crosses over from food into finances, and the fundamentals of public relations. This might seem like a strange position from someone who owns her own public relations company, but I struggled with working with only one large agency when I worked in the corporate world and have watched others grapple with it, too.

The concept of one-stop shopping is appealing, but if all your efforts - public relations, advertising, marketing, etc. are going through the same company - be prepared for some challenges. Some of the pain points I experienced included:

-larger companies can't always turn projects around on short notice

-if you become unsatisfied with the service you are receiving, severing ties can be difficult. Your agency is likely to be the liaison between many important subcontractors - such as graphic designers, web designers, etc.

-it is difficult, even for large companies, to be the expert in everything

So how do you work around this? Consider bringing someone in on a project basis. Notice I said "someone" and not "company." Adding on a competing agency will only increase your challenges with your current agency, and won't solve any of the problems outlined above. In my case, we discussed our decision to bring on an independent PR practitioner with our agency before we actually did it. We explained this was simply a new project we were given and we wanted to take the opportunity to have one person solely dedicated to this initiative. We weren't interested in severing our ties, we just wanted more options.