If you have to have a strategy session then I find it best to do this with someone that you respect (in my case this was Matthew my husband), in a place that inspires you (the Yorkshire Sculpture Park) and with the right attitude.
Having looked at the weather forecast on the 31st December we were sizing up which would be the best of the bad weather days to head over to the Yorkshire Sculpture Park (www.ysp.co.uk). As it turns out we could choose from either one drop of rain moving up to two drops of rain on the 1st January or two drops of raining moving on to one drop of rain on the 2nd. We decided to have a lazy day on the 1st and head over to the YSP on the second.
Since about May/June 2015 I started to mull over what my company could look like and what the ethics should be behind it. I had handwritten notes and ideas in my trusty turquoise folder A4 notebook. It was time to pull it all into something cohesive and deliverable.
The weather was definitely more two drops than one drop in the morning and so there would be no chance of an open air strategy writing session. Instead we spoke about the vision, mission, aims and objectives for the company during the journey there, over lunch and on the way back. All logged carefully in my notebook.
Here is the vision for Provenance Craft Co.:
"To sell carefully sourced, practical, beautiful, quality products for the knitting, crocheting and crafting community."
If I had to pull everything into one word, that word would be 'provenance'. I don't know the provenance of an item, I won't use it/sell it.
I now need to pull all of the work from the strategy session into a set of PowerPoint slides so that I can always refer back to them and remember what I wanted the company to look like and adhere to from the outset.
A good day's work.
