Strategic Initiatives Appendix

Defining Project Categories

Organizational Strategic Initiatives

Organizational Strategic Initiatives are expected to require the most significant development and/or change leadership efforts across our organization. As a rule, these initiatives are ones which require a partnership of responsibility between at least 3 of our divisions to accomplish them, and are expected to require focus for a duration of 2 or more quarters of the year. We’re calling these “initiatives” because they will often be more broadly integrative into our ongoing ministry philosophies and strategies, than they will be neatly-contained projects. The aim is to define an objective that can be measured and accomplished in no more than 1 year’s time.

Organizational Major Projects

Organizational Major Projects are development efforts that require responsibility partnership between 2-3 divisions for 2 or more quarters of the year.

Divisional Major Projects

Divisional Major Projects are development efforts that are primarily within 1 division for 2 or more quarters.

Projects

Projects are most any other developmental effort that is expected to be able to be accomplished within a single quarter.

Organizational Strategic Initiatives are ones that we all need to be aware of and consider most in our planning. When it comes to trade-off decisions, these are the initiatives that should generally “win”. So, these are the ones to be communicated and coordinated more broadly and in more detail.

Other projects require efforts for which it will be helpful to make them clear and visible so that we can better understand what we’re all working on, and cooperate accordingly.

As you can see, greater anticipated dedication of time, effort, and teams gets greater visibility in the alignment of our decision-making throughout the organization.