Development of a revised Strategic Plan now on the front burner - start thinking about it.

By Pepper Parr

February 26, 2015

BURLINGTON, ON

With the budget in place and a new city manager hired, Council is now going to turn its mind to the Strategic Plan.

The Plan is a document that gets put together by a city council early in its term.

Four years ago, what was a council with three new members, took on the task of doing a real Strategic Plan. In the past the Strat Plan was often not much more than a collection of pictures.

The new blood on the 2010 Council brought energy and insight to the process.

It was a solid effort during which some serious divides in the thinking on just how the city should grow revealed themselves.

Gerogina Black, the KPMG facilitator who took Council through their 2011 Strategic Plan exercise had a soft spot for Councillor – the feeling was mutual. Some good work was done in 2011

KPMG facilitator Georgina Black did a superb job of leading the group through 11 half day sessions. What Black learned very quickly was that the group did not have a BHAG – most didn’t know what a BHAG was. Part of the purpose behind the developing of a Strategic Plan is to look at the bigger picture and think big.

Some in Burlington might shudder at the idea of thinking big – visions of the pier debacle come into their minds.

A BHAG Black explained was a Big Hairy Audacious Goal – thinking outside the box and seeing over the hill and into the future.

Burlington often seems like a place that lets itself be defined by its geography – the Escarpment and the waterfront – with not that much in between
With four years under their collective belts Council can be expected to take a much different approach to what it wants to set out as its next plan.
This time around the city will have a city manager who has some significant depth in planning – expect that to make a difference.

What will also make a difference is the now much clearer political divide of this council. The role the Mayor is going to play, or not going to play, will be interesting to watch.

In 2011 Mayor Goldring had a Chief of Staff who is a very strong strategic thinker – Frank McKeown is no longer with the Mayor – he runs the Economic Development Corporation and can be expected to bring forward the views of that organization and not be the Mayor’s thinker.

Frank McKeown, then the Mayors Chief of Staff explains a concept to Ward 5 Councillor Paul Sharman during the development of the 2011 Strategic Plan.  McKeown was described as the 7th council member during the Strategic Plan sessions. This time around he will speak for the economic development corporation

The city has a panel of a couple of hundred people that it runs ideas past; they call it the Insight Panel. It is a program the city signed up for at a cost of $100,000 a year for three years. They recently asked for some response to a clutch of questions related to the development of a Strategic plan.

At the end of the survey they provided a chart summarizing the views of the people who had completed the survey. It did not bode well for the starting point of the 2015 Strategic Plan development process.

The responders were people being asked what they thought and felt about how the city was doing with its Strategic Plan. Clearly council has its work cut out for themselves when they create the next four year Strategic Plan

The city is updating its strategic plan, checking in to make sure the plan will take our city where we all want to go.
In the introduction to the survey staff explained “it is designed to ask what you think about city services, whether you feel engaged, priority identification and how you want to hear from the city.” They are certainly hearing – are they listening.

The city website has a section devoted to the Strategic Plan. In that section they set out where they are at this point in time and what they expect the roll out of the process will be.

“With the new term of council, the city is updating its strategic plan, keeping the major elements while making adjustments based on new and emerging realities, demands and challenges. We are taking a close look at what strategic priorities have been finished, which need to be started and what we should add or change” says the website

“The 2015-18 City of Burlington strategic plan will build on past success while reaching for future goals. This is your strategic plan. It is your chance to tell council what’s important to you.”

Strategic Plan roll out schedule:

Then city manager Roman Martiuk leads staff and council members through the development of an idea.

Stage 1 – May to Dec 2014

Stage 2 – Nov. 2014 to April 2015

There were so many pages of thoughts and idea created when the 2011 Strategic |Plan was being created – every available space got put to use.

Stage 3 – May to June 2015

Stage 4 – June 2015

Staff played a full and significant role in the development of the 2011 Strategic Plan

Stage 5 – July 2015

Plan Approval: Final version of the draft strategic plan to City Council

STATUS: Summer 2015

Stage 6 – Ongoing