The role and importance of strategy workshops: findings of a UK survey

Twenty years ago strategy was synonymous with formalised strategic planning. Nowadays, although strategic planning systems still exist in organisations, they are not seen as the main or only vehicle through which strategies actually develop. It is recognised that other managerial processes play animportant role.One of those processes is strategy workshops or away days and it seems that these have become very commonplace. They typically take the form of managers taking time from their everyday tasks to consider the strategic situation facing the organisation and how they might best move forward.Although there has been much research into traditional strategic planning systems, we know very little about strategy workshops. Indeed at the start of the project summarised in this report we found that even basic information, such as how often these workshops take place, which types of organisation undertake them, who goes on them, the perceived effectiveness of these events, and so on, is simply not known. So here we have a common phenomenon, supposedly influencing the strategy development of organisations, about which we know virtually nothing. In the absence of such information how can organisations improve the practice of strategy workshops, developing individuals to play an effective role in these events? The project reported here was undertaken to help address this major shortfall in our knowledge of this sphere of management practice. Our study constitutes the first ever attempt to establish a better picture of what goes on at such workshops and their effectiveness. The findings provide a number of key insights into the scale and scope of these activities and the extent to which and in what ways they help contribute to the effectivedevelopment and implementation of strategies in organisations.