Setting annual priorities
How to turn a board's priorities into a shared, decision-ready plan instead of a wish list.
Annual priorities should start with a shared vision statement the board adopts and applies to every decision, not a project wish list. A clear strategic planning process focuses resources, strengthens operations, and keeps the board, manager, and committees aligned on the same goals for the year.
Start with a vision, not a wish list
Most boards start the wrong way: someone circulates a list of deferred projects, and the year's "priorities" become whatever got the most votes or the loudest complaint. Practitioners writing for the Community Associations Institute describe the order reversed. A board decides what it wants the community to look like first, then uses that statement to sort every proposal that follows.
"If a board wants to look at a strategic plan, they must first engage in setting a vision statement for the community and use that vision statement throughout all of its decisions."
Source: Establishing a roadmap: Strategic planning in community associations, Community Associations Institute
Without that step, "priority" just means whoever asked most recently. With it, a new proposal has a test: does this move us toward the vision, or is it just urgent.
What a real planning process buys the board
A strategic plan is not paperwork for its own sake. CAI frames its purpose in concrete terms: it gives the board a way to say no.
"It sets priorities, focuses energy and resources, strengthens operations, (and) ensures stakeholders are working toward common goals."
Source: Establishing a roadmap: Strategic planning in community associations, Community Associations Institute
That last part matters as much as the first: "stakeholders" includes the manager and any committees the board relies on. If the board sets priorities in a vacuum and never shares them, the manager is left guessing which of a hundred small decisions actually matter this year.
Set the direction, then delegate the execution
Once the board has a short list of priorities, its job on each one is mostly done. Under the board-manager division of labor CAI describes, boards make decisions about policy, budgets, and direction; managers implement those decisions. Getting vendor quotes, scheduling the work, and handling the paperwork belongs to whoever the board delegates the priority to, not to the board itself.
CAI is direct about what delegation actually means:
"Delegation is about empowering people by giving them the authority, tools, and confidence they need to succeed."
Source: Delegation: Key to Successful HOA Leadership, Community Associations Institute
A board that sets a priority and then insists on approving every quote itself hasn't delegated, it has just added a layer. See Avoiding micromanagement and Delegation for how to hand off the parts that aren't the board's to run.
Check yourself
Answer before you read the explanation, recalling it is what makes it stick.
A newly elected board sits down to build next year's project list. Where should they start?
Two directors keep pushing competing projects, each insisting theirs is "the priority." What actually breaks that kind of deadlock?
The board adopts "repave the parking lot" as this year's top priority. Who should now collect vendor quotes and manage the details?
Sources
- Establishing a roadmap: Strategic planning in community associations, Community Associations Institute
- Delegation: Key to Successful HOA Leadership, Community Associations Institute
- Board-Manager Partnerships: 5 Ways to Build Stronger Relationships, Community Associations Institute
Board Leadership
Once your priorities are set, the next question is how you'll know if you're on track: see Tracking board goals.
Whether your bylaws require a formal annual plan or budget process, and how much authority the board can delegate to committees versus your community manager, depends on your association's own governing documents.