Barriers to Effective Strategic Planning

Despite the best intentions and a lot of hard work, strategic planning most predictably fails. It’s not that strategic planning is a bad idea but there are some barriers which involve in its failure. This paper explores how and where strategic planning goes awry and what executives can do about it. The study finds some of the most common barriers in effective strategic planning like, strict time limits, identical procedures, lack of accountability, power and influence which organizations frequently face in strategy formulation and implementation. It is concluded that, in order to achieve the goal of effective strategic planning, effective change management and leadership are indispensable. On the one hand, it is mandatory for the leadership to involve employees in decision making process, along with the explicit description of their roles within the organization, and on the other hand, full mechanism of employees’ accountability and regular checks are required to remove these barriers.