Communicating the strategic plan

Here are some suggestions for how to bring the vision and strategic plan to life in your area and key messaging for different elements.

Background

The University of Manchester is launching Our future, its new vision and strategic plan, in January 2020.
Our vision describes the future we want for our University. This is an ambitious long-term vision to take us into our third century.
Our strategic plan sets our University priorities for the first five years of our journey towards the vision and it is a blend of new and existing projects.

We will be recognised globally for the excellence of our people, research, learning, and innovation, and for the benefits we bring to society and the environment.
This builds on the University’s previous vision by incorporating a focus on our people, innovation and the environment.

We have built our strategic plan around the existing three core goals and four new themes.
Our new strategic plan aims for simplicity. It is shorter than previous strategic plans and has fewer measures of success.
Our three core goals remain – research and discovery, teaching and learning, and social responsibility.
Our people, the core of which are our staff and students, and our values are at the heart of our plan, while our themes – innovation, civic engagement, and global influence – underpin everything we do.
Under each core goal and theme, we have identified our priorities for the next five years. Some of these are already underway. Others may require funding and resources to deliver.
Each core goal and theme will have a plan, which presents the same priorities described in the strategic plan, in more detail.
The strategic plan reinforces what already makes The University of Manchester distinctive by building on our strengths while taking us in new directions.

We have built our vision and strategic plan together with colleagues, students, alumni, and regional and national stakeholders. More than 700 ideas were submitted by 4,000 staff, students, alumni and external stakeholders. You can view all the ideas on the Our future section of StaffNet.
Prominent among the numerous ideas was one consistent theme – ‘how we do things’. This is reflected throughout the strategic plan, particularly in the Our people, our values theme.

As an autonomous institution, we will strive to bring our shared values to life. They are:

Knowledge - We are ambitious in our pursuit of new ideas, greater understanding and discovery.
Wisdom - We share and apply our knowledge and experience to guide balanced and evidenced decisions for ourselves and for society.
Humanity - We embrace and celebrate difference, respect and support each other and act with integrity to benefit society and the environment by transforming and enriching lives.
Academic freedom - We support with enthusiasm and vigour the principles of freedom of thought and speech.
Courage - We think and speak freely, and act boldly to challenge assumptions and to shape our future for the greater good.
Pioneering spirit - In the radical Manchester spirit, and inspired by our people, history and scale, we create the exceptional.

Colleagues from across our University came together to help shape our values which sit at the heart of the strategic plan.

Our values are what we hold to be important, including the standards we expect of one another as we work together to achieve our vision.

More than 730 colleagues have been involved in this work by contributing their experiences and stories.

Our new set of values simplifies our former values and incorporates our motto: Knowledge, Wisdom and Humanity.