The Most Important Strategy

I've been re-reading my Tom Peters lately, and it reminds me that for all the hard work independent schools put into strategic planning we keep missing the most important strategy of all: being extraordinary!  If every school were truly extraordinary, then we wouldn't keep hearing in focus groups with parents that XYZ School is "the best public school education money can buy."  Or, that it is hard to tell the value added by paying $20K or more for grade school.

IF (1) a school has a compelling and distinctive mission that clearly differentiates it from other options in the market, AND (2) there are enough families in the market with sufficient income to purchase an independent school education, AND (3) the school is extraordinary in every possible way, THEN additional strategies become moot.  So, how about this for your next strategic planning process: organize around three questions in sequence:

1.  Is our mission compelling and distinction enough to set us apart in our market?

2.  Are there sufficient families with means to purchase the number of full-pay seats we need to sell for sustainability?

And, after we get the first two out of the way:

3.  How do we make ourselves enduringly extraordinary; e.g., what Seth Godin calls a "purple cow"?