ATD Blog
Explore how custom Generative Pre-trained Transformers (GPTs) can enhance the strategic planning process.
Thu Jan 23 2025
In most modern organizations, strategic planning is no longer a process siloed in executive leadership and cascaded top-down. There’s a bottom-up component, where leaders across the organization share insights and recommendations for paths forward.
This ensures that strategic priorities are informed by reality and are more readily adopted. But how can you be sure leaders have the necessary data? How can you help them discover connections across metrics and guide them to have deeper conversations about strategy? An approach that’s enabled by Generative AI (GAI) supports strategic planning—and more importantly, strategic thinking—at scale.
At TiER1 Performance, we’re tackling this challenge with a unique approach: custom Generative Pre-trained Transformers (GPTs) that enhance the strategic planning process. This isn’t just about GAI; it’s about empowering leaders to slice through avalanches of data and bring the best insights forward. By integrating AI as a tool to unlock people’s fullest potential, organizations can maintain their focus on human value.
Instead of combing through reports and spreadsheets, engage with a customized AI that transforms data into insights. Tailored to your needs, the AI model will bring financial summaries and employee experience data into focus, making complex information accessible, digestible, and actionable. You can uncover immediate, insightful responses to questions like How have our revenue streams evolved over the past year? and What trends are emerging in employee satisfaction and retention?
This AI won’t just answer questions; it will also present facts, ask probing questions, and capture insights—all without drawing its own conclusions. It’ll push you to engage deeply with the data, reflect, and capture your thoughts and reactions. It will also ask you questions like What could be driving these changes? and Do you see any potential opportunities or concerns based on these trends?
The valuable insights gained from AI enable you to lead cohort discussions to bring ideas together and inspire fresh perspectives. These collaborative and dynamic sessions allow leaders to discuss and debate, explore interpretations, and consider potential strategies. Record and transcribe each session to capture the thought processes, debates, and reasoning that underpin any decision making.
Having these transcripts at your fingertips is transformative. They will inform a custom GPT designed to help create a tailored pre-planning guide for the executive team. You can also revisit them anytime to ensure that no idea is lost and everyone’s contribution is acknowledged. This practice fosters a culture of continuous learning and shared ownership, where collaboration is more than a meeting; it’s a strategic advantage.
Once you’re armed with insights from the cohort discussions, conduct a one-on-one “interview” with a custom GPT and encourage other leaders to do the same. Treat this AI interaction like a personal coach, letting it guide you through strategic questions about future growth opportunities, market trends, and innovative approaches. The AI’s reflection prompts will encourage leaders to think deeply and creatively without the pressure of group dynamics.
These individual sessions offer a unique space for everyone to explore their thoughts freely, leading to original insights that enrich the organization’s strategic outlook. By blending creativity and analytical thinking, this one-on-one interaction strengthens the overall planning process and ensures that each leader’s unique ideas are part of that vision.
After cohort discussions and individual AI sessions, use a final custom GPT to compile all insights and create a pre-planning guide for the executive team. This guide should be a dynamic, on-demand briefing that executives can query whenever they need immediate context or a quick strategic overview. By synthesizing insights from every discussion and interaction, this AI-powered guide provides a consolidated view of key information—ensuring alignment across the organization.
This streamlined approach makes the planning process more efficient, allowing leaders to move swiftly from insight to action. Time spent searching through documents is minimized, giving leaders the bandwidth to focus on leading strategically and confidently.
Integrating custom AI tools into strategic planning provides significant advantages:
Enhanced Insights: AI surfaces hidden patterns and correlations, enabling more data-driven decisions.
Stronger Collaboration: Recording and transcribing cohort discussions creates a knowledge-sharing environment that supports ongoing innovation.
Creative Freedom: One-on-one AI sessions encourage leaders to dive deeper to develop innovative ideas that expand strategic options.
Efficient Decision Making: The final AI pre-planning guide provides instant access to critical information, eliminating time-consuming searches and enabling rapid decision making.
The possibilities for AI-powered strategic planning are vast, from predictive analytics to real-time data integration, with the potential to enable organizations to create more adaptive, future-focused strategies. It’s important to emphasize that while AI serves as a powerful tool, it doesn’t replace human judgment—it amplifies it. The real value lies in your people, and AI can help bring out their best, providing insights and efficiency that allow leaders to make more thoughtful and meaningful decisions.
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