How to Succeed at Planning: Looking Forward/Working Backward

1. How to Succeed at Planning: Looking Forward/Working Backward Nan Westervelt, Faculty 2006 ESP Summer Seminar

2. Overview of Session Participants will • Know the steps to take that will cultivate a trusting & open relationship among partners & develop a shared commitment to what success looks like • Understand how a model planning process combined with strategic planning (“Backward Design”) can launch and guide partnership planning efforts • Integrate successful and proven exercises into future planning sessions and/or plan a retreat to launch their partnership efforts

3. Partnership A relationship between individuals or groups that is characterized by mutual cooperation and responsibility, as for the achievement of a specified goal. Jane Remer

4. Theory – Characteristics of Effective Partnerships • What are characteristics of effective partnerships? • “Learning Partnerships—Improving Learning in Schools with Arts Partners in Communities” by Craig Dreeszen, Ph.D, Arts Extension Service University of Massachusetts ( www.umass.edu/aes/learningpartners • “Partnership Planning Process Checklist (adapted from the “Learning Partnerships Planning Workbook”

5. Theory into Practice • Know Yourself • What is your reason for collaborating? • What do you want out of the partnership? • What do you contribute to the partnership? • What limits your participation? (Personnel, facilities, financial policy or legal restrictions)

6. Create an “Opportunity Statement” • Represents the shared understanding of the intentions, hopes and expectations of the partnership • What is the challenge that we wish to solve? Or what need or opportunity do we want to resolve? [For whom—How would the school be improved, changed or different if we were successful? • What is the solution to the challenge or the End result we’d like to see happen? • Describe the activities we’ll do to make it happen • What are the values & beliefs that should guide us in our day-to-day interactions with each other and our constituencies? Why we do it—Core Values

7. Guidelines & Tips* • Purpose: One sentence that describes the end result the partnership team seeks to accomplish and for whom • Business: The primary means used to accomplish the purpose (action, services, program, etc.) • Values: A list of values and beliefs shared by members of the team and practiced in their work.

8. How might having an “Opportunity Statement” for your partnership be helpful—if at all?

9. Vision Vs. “Opportunity Statement” (aka Mission) • Opportunity Statement answers the questions: • Why does our partnership exist? • What “business” are we in? • What values will guide us? • Vision statement answers the question: • What will success look like? • Challenges and inspires the partnership to achieve its “mission”

10. Next Steps • Re-visit your project idea • Does it align with what you learned about the motivations, needs, and wants of your partners? • Your Opportunity Statement? • Your vision? • Establish or Re-confirm Partnership Goals & Objectives • Use the Partnership Planning Process Checklist as a guide in launching planning and as a “touchstone” throughout the life of your partnership

11. Reflection-Create a Lune • Lune—A three-line poem consisting of 3 words, 5 words, and 3 words (aka American Haiku) • Last line often expresses a surprise or a question. (You can illustrate your poem) • Theme: “What I know (or have learned) about planning an effective partnership.” • Optional sharing

12. *Tips for Writing a Mission • Purpose (End result): • Use an infinitive verb that indicates a change in status (e.g., to increase, to decrease, to eliminate, to prevent, etc.) • Identify problem to be addressed or condition to be changed • Business (Means): • Use verb such as “to provide,” or link a purpose statement with the words “by” or “through” • Values & Beliefs (Guides your work): • Driving values of an organization exist, whether spoken or not, in all partnerships, but in the most successful ones, they are spoken