SC QUALITY GUILDStrategic plan builder
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Write the mission, vision, values and quality policy, link each strategic objective to the tactics that deliver it, and check every tactic against SMART.
ON THE EXAM · CMQ/OE II.A, II.C.1, III.D.1 · FREE · NOTHING YOU TYPE LEAVES YOUR BROWSER
Q-BotClick for an explanation of this tool.For educational use. This page is a study aid. The method behind it has far more depth and detail than one page and one tool can cover, and what you see here is not everything the method offers or everything this site offers. For full understanding and application, use the governing standards and texts, and seek further education, training or qualified advice. Results depend on the data you enter, so check them before relying on them.
The elements of a strategic plan
A strategic plan connects why the organization exists to what people will do this year. The usual elements, from the top down:
- Mission: the organization's purpose today. What it does, for whom, and why. It changes rarely.
- Vision: the future state the organization wants to reach, usually stated for several years out. It should be specific enough to decide what is in and out of the strategy.
- Values: the principles that guide behavior and decisions while pursuing the vision.
- Strategic objectives: the few long-range results, typically three to five years out, that move the organization from where it is toward the vision.
- Tactical plans: the shorter-term actions, each with an owner, a measure, a target and a date, that deliver an objective.
Planning starts with an environmental scan (see the SWOT and PESTLE tool).
Strategy versus tactics
Strategy decides what to achieve and where to compete; tactics decide how, by whom and by when. A common exam trap is a "strategic objective" that is really a tactic ("install new software") or a tactic with no objective behind it. The tool flags both: objectives with no tactics, and tactics that point to no objective.
SMART tactics
SMART is the common test for an objective or tactic: specific, measurable, achievable, relevant and time-bound. The tool derives four of the five from the row: a described action with an owner, a measure with a numeric target, a link to a strategic objective, and a due date. Achievability is a judgment, so you mark it.
The quality policy
Under ISO 9001:2015 clause 5.2.1, top management sets the quality policy. In summary, the policy has to suit the organization's purpose and context and back its strategy, give a basis for setting quality objectives, and commit the organization both to meeting the requirements that apply to it and to improving continually. The tool searches the policy text for those commitments. It is a word search, so read the result as a prompt to check, not a verdict.
On the CMQ/OE exam
Expect questions that ask you to tell a mission from a vision, to pick the best-written objective, to place an activity at the strategic or tactical level, and to identify what a quality policy must contain.