As the Associate Vice President of the Office of Planning and Institutional Effectiveness at the University of DC, Maria Byrd provides the institution with strategic data and assessment planning and management. When her leadership role began to evolve during the pandemic, she decided to up her strategic game at Harvard Business School's Strategic Agility—Virtual program.
A data analytics program that I was going to attend at HBS was canceled due to the pandemic. During that time, my position transitioned into more of an executive leadership role.
So when I saw the email about the Strategic Agility—Virtual program, I realized that, especially in these volatile times, agility is huge. Learning how to be agile, while also setting goals and planning strategies, was very useful for me and extremely beneficial for my organization.
This program exceeded my expectations. It enabled me to start evaluating my own approach to strategic planning and how I operate within the organization, both professionally and practically in my everyday work. I gained great insight through group discussions with other classmates who shared diverse experiences of being agile.
The professors bridged the connection between what we learned from case studies and our everyday business practices and operational responsibilities. This provided us with tangible examples of how what we were learning related to what we will be managing in our evolving business environment.
I thought that I would need to be on campus to fully grasp the course content, but it wasn't that way at all. I printed out all the case studies or put them in a notebook file on my laptop and read them. Before each session, we had small group discussions about the cases—those discussions were so vital.
The way the program was set up allowed me to feel that I was really part of the HBS community. And because we were so engaged and fully involved, I definitely did not check email for work during the session. I didn't want to miss anything.
Shortly after the course was over, I sent an email to the president to talk about how many of the core theories and knowledge gained from case studies directly related to our strategic planning work within the university. I was involved in the initial stage of our strategic planning process for the last four years. My mind was really jogging during the program. As a result, we are entering the second phase of our strategic plan.
I learned that if you set goals without agility, you end up having a plan that is too strict. You need to figure out what you're trying to achieve and then build objectives and goals that are flexible. Then you can create key performance indicators that allow you to reach those goals. If you want to get stakeholder buy-in, it's important to listen.
My advice would be the same as if you were flying off to Boston for the week. Be very clear with your organization that you're not in the office, and just do your best to fully engage within the process. The program moves quickly and builds on the knowledge you gain each day. So you need to make sure you're not missing any key components.
There are afternoon speaker sessions that are optional. The program hosts top leaders in various industries, and they have so much to share about strategy. Instead of using that time to catch up on work or do something else, take these speaker sessions as if they were required. You'll gain so much insight, and it will be extremely fruitful in your career.