Action Plan Best Practices

An action plan is a critical organizational tool when teams are involved.  When kept updated, it’s use as a central point of communication is highly effective.  It helps each person understand how to best plan their activities so that the whole team can advance quickly in strong alignment.  It empowers each individual to bring their greatest game, elevating the ultimate outcome.  

One template may not “fit all” for this.  Whether you use a full-blown project plan, a backlog, or a simple spreadsheet, these are key components you want to include in the document:

• Team goals are clear, front, and center
• The overall plan has a clear scope, with key milestones, and is organized in a hierarchy that is easy to follow
• Action items are described in a manner that is easy to understand by someone who has not been exposed to the details
• Prioritization is very clear and intuitive to follow 
• Each deliverable has a clear outcome and indicates who is ultimately responsible for ensuring it's completed to meet expectations of time, quality, and scope
• The page layout includes a column header, a natural flow for review, and prints to one page wide
• All due dates are realistic and in the future 
• The document is easily accessible by all team members

This checklist can be used to review a draft action plan to confirm it’s ready to share with others for feedback.

Collaborating and including all perspectives in the approach is very important to achieving optimal results.  Team buy-in is essential for people to be inclined to dedicate the extra effort needed to achieve the goals.  It can be helpful to include these practices into your plan:

• Invite various stakeholders to give feedback to both the goals and action items.  Incorporate their ideas in to the plan.
• Engage a couple of individuals that can run with leading the work and are motivated to do so.  They can collaborate together and come up with recommended solutions to challenges they face along the way.  
• Identify experts that can influence the approach you take by coaching your team.
• Evaluate impacted processes for improvements (including automation, tools, checks and balances, and reporting).  Implement cross-training where lacking. 
• Establish review patterns to illicit feedback from senior stakeholders on project milestones to elevate output and shape approach.
• Recognize achievement of all team members that deliver the work.