When Everything Is a Priority, Nothing Is Strategic
Strategy is not a document, it’s a practice
Leaders today are operating in constant motion. Funding shifts, political pressure, community need, and opportunity arrive all at once. In that environment, it can feel necessary to stay responsive, say yes often, and trust that momentum alone will carry an organization forward.
But momentum without direction is not strategy. It is drift.
When a strategic plan is outdated or absent, teams do not slow down. They work harder. They fill the gap with urgency and good intentions. Over time, effort becomes scattered. Priorities multiply. People lose clarity about their lane, their impact, and how their work connects to the whole.
When everything is a priority, nothing is strategic.
I experienced this firsthand stepping into leadership where the last strategic plan had been completed several years earlier. There was no failure in that reality. The context had simply changed faster than the plan had been refreshed. What I found was a capable, committed team doing meaningful work, but without a shared, current framework to guide decisions.
That is not a team issue. That is a leadership responsibility.
Strategy is often misunderstood as a document or a moment in time. A retreat. A binder. A set of slides. In practice, strategy is a discipline. It is how leaders make choices. It is how teams understand where to focus. It is how organizations say no with clarity and yes with intention.
A current strategic plan creates a filter. Without that filter, every opportunity feels equally important. The loudest need wins. The most urgent request takes precedence. Over time, this erodes focus, increases burnout, and makes impact harder to see, even when the work is strong.
This is why strategy must be treated as a practice, not a one-time event.
In my experience, strategic plans benefit from being refreshed every three to five years, with priorities and roadmaps revisited annually. Not because the mission changes, but because the environment does. Funding landscapes shift. Community needs evolve. Assumptions must be tested. A living strategy allows an organization to adapt without losing its center.
At its best, planning is an act of care.
Clarity protects people. It helps teams understand their role, their lane, and how their work contributes to something larger. It gives leaders a grounded way to make decisions, especially when the answer has to be no.
What good planning looks like in practice:
A small, clear set of priorities that guide daily decision-making
Defined lanes so teams know where to focus and where not to stretch
A shared filter for evaluating new opportunities and requests
Connection between long-term vision and near-term roadmaps
Regular refreshes as context, funding, and conditions change
Good planning does not eliminate uncertainty. It provides direction within it.
At Piñon, we support leaders across sectors in two ways. Sometimes that means working behind the scenes with executives to prepare them for how to lead teams through strategic planning, alignment, and change. Other times, it means partnering directly with entire teams to design, refresh, and operationalize strategic plans and roadmaps that are realistic, aligned, and actionable.
Direction, when held consistently, allows good work to become sustainable work
