This post originally appeared on the MRSC Insight Blog. Read it on MRSC. There is a moment when a group walks into the first strategic planning session full of energy and goodwill—and it can feel like the work is just beginning. But in my facilitation practice, strategic planning begins long before anyone walks into a meeting room. That first session is not the launch—it is the moment the foundation becomes visible. The preparation that happens in advance—largely under the ra

This post originally appeared on the MRSC Insight Blog. Read it on MRSC. When I ask local government leaders whether their organization has a strategic plan, I hear the same answer more often than you would think: "We have our comp plan." I get it. Comprehensive plans are substantial documents. They take years to develop, involve extensive community engagement, and carry real legal weight. If your agency has invested that kind of effort, it feels like the planning box is chec

Author's note, March 2026: I'm republishing this piece because the conversation it describes keeps coming up. In recent months, several board leaders have reached out during leadership transitions, and the instinct is almost always the same: move quickly, fill the vacancy, get back to business. My advice, counterintuitively, is to pause. Here’s why. In March 2024, I got a call from MRSC—the Municipal Research and Services Center of Washington, a statewide organization ser

If you think you're having more meetings than you did a few years ago, you're absolutely right. Since the pandemic, meetings have multiplied in frequency, in length, and in how they bleed into evenings and weekends. In every city I work with, the calendars tell the same story: back-to-back meetings, each one an opportunity to advance your priorities, solve problems, and make decisions that matter. Yet many of you tell me you're spending more time in meetings than actually doi