Leading Boards of Directors to set a three-year Strategic Visioning Plan

Serving on a Life Plan Community board of directors is all business — and calling — to provide sound advice and guidance to the organization’s business while casting a strategic vision for the future so it can extend its mission and services to more people.

A strong board will periodically designate its work toward forecasting strategic initiatives that ensure the overall wellbeing of the organization and the people they serve. How a board goes about the process is as important as the ultimate initiatives, goals and plans the board develops.

WellPointe’s approach to strategic wellness inspires boards to maximize their effectiveness in imagining possibilities, decision-making and successful outcomes.

WellPointe designed and facilitated a custom Strategic Planning Retreat for the Board of Trustees of a premier, well-established community in South Carolina. The purpose of the retreat was to review the 2022 Strategic Plan and set new 3-year objectives for the 2025 Strategic Visioning Plan, facilitated by WellPointe. 

The Client

Still Hopes Episcopal Retirement Community , (Still Hopes) is a non-profit Life Plan Community in Columbia, SC, that serves 700+ members on- and off-campus with 650+ staff members and a Board of Trustees’ membership of 18. Still Hopes’ Mission is to provide a faith-based community where life will be rich and full as God intends it to be, holding to our values, serving one another with dedication and promoting health and wellness for all. Still Hopes carries out its mission through its vision to exemplify a new expectation for senior living.

The Agenda

Working with senior leadership WellPointe developed an agenda for the retreat that:

• Set the tone for creative, collaborative and critical group thinking

• Celebrated and effectively illustrated 20 years of significant physical and program development at Still Hopes

• Reviewed and evaluated outcomes of the most recent past strategic planning

• Reviewed the current strategic plan

• Presented results of a Leadership Team study on:

  • their perspective of Still Hopes position in the senior living industry

  • ratings of key elements of Still Hopes, i.e., services, facilities, pricing, resident involvement, staff engagement, financials, technologies, innovation, partnerships, etc.

• Provided education and insight into major senior living trends

• Identified major opportunities for market penetration, product development, market development, and diversification strategies for current and new product-lines and current and new markets

• Helped prioritize top high-level initiatives

• Prioritized and set the major SMART objectives to be accomplished over next 3 years

• Concluded with a Board meeting

Process Highlights

• Advance preparation for Board members
  Board members completed a survey in advance of the retreat. The self-assessment of their work, accomplishments, and vision for the future was tabulated and presented at the retreat. Some questions included:

  How well have we served our stakeholders?

  Did we stay true to our stated mission & vision … how or how not?

  Did we stay true to our stated values … how or how not?

  As a Board, what are we deeply passionate about?

• Collaboration and visioning exercises
  Healthy group-think is the result of authentic collaboration and trust. Board members engaged in a series of brief creative exercises to generate a sense of teamwork and shared desire for positive outcome, and some fun too.

• Review and evaluation

Past Growth
Looking back over 20 years of the community’s expansion and development of facilities and programs reminded Board members of their significant accomplishments and encouraged openness to consider BIG, lofty ideas for the future, within context and without fear or skepticism.

SWOT Analysis
Similarly, Board members reviewed and evaluated its previous SWOT analysis and the success of goals and objectives set at their previous retreat.

Update on the Goals of current strategic plan

• Resources, background information for visioning
  In advance of the retreat, WellPointe gathered perspectives on the positioning of Still Hopes and its key elements from members of the Leadership Team. Their perspectives were presented in aggregate in the form of ratings and a personification of how they see Still Hopes today.
  
  WellPointe also presented educational information about the senior living industry and trends in healthcare, housing and wellness to watch over the next 10-15 years, particularly during the exponential growth of the senior adult population and changes in retirement expectations.

• Consideration of high-level initiatives
  WellPointe provided in-depth description and potential results of several initiatives for the Board to consider and prioritize. Some initiatives included:

  • Forming a Development Corporation to support and extend the mission and vision by seeding and developing additional and new communities, products and services.

  • Developing two Mid-Market communities (one adjacent to Still Hopes and one in a small town ~100 miles from Still Hopes)

  • Developing a Childcare Center to benefit workforce and the wider community

  • Growing the at Home product-line into 2 new markets

  • Advancing the formation of a Home Health Care product-line to complement their Home Care line

  • Repositioning Futures Resident Program to include a Continuing Care at Home-like product line

  • Advancing a Technology Initiative for residents and the community management

  • Conducting two Philanthropy Capital Campaigns and considering the formation of a Philanthropic Foundation

  • Instituting a Workforce Development Initiative

  • Exploring affiliation and collaboration opportunities with appropriate Life Plan Community organizations and an OLLI program with USC

  • Creating a Senior Resource initiative to establish Still Hopes as the region’s premier resource providing valued consultation, networks, options, guidance and solutions for the area’s seniors.

The retreat was reviewed as being stimulating, informative, relational, compelling, predictive, a bit opportunistic, and just downright fun!  The retreat was considered a success in that it help produce an appropriately challenging and meaningful host of significant, purpose-filled goals for the next 3 years.