“…outdated annual strategic plans and objectives.”
If your strategy and objectives have become outdated within a year, your plan is the problem. You either did not identify an appropriate strategy and set of objectives or you made your plan too specific for the environment that you are working in.
A strategy should have flexibility built into. It should not be the controlling factor of day-to-day working, but the director of what you are doing. It’s your foundation, your guiding beacon, your map. Your objectives are your mile markers and your break points. Reaching an objective is the beginning of the next stage and a moment for reflection and evaluation.
The plan makes spontaneity possible. It means that you don’t have to start each project from scratch. The plan means you know where the spontaneous project fits in and what it has to accomplish. The plan tells you whether your spontaneous project is a fresh idea or a whim.
There are always going to be new things that will pop up — last minute things that you didn’t foresee. We have to be ready to deal with them, and we have to make sure they are cohesive with your brand, with your goals, and with your customers. That’s the role of the plan.
Maybe I’m just misunderstanding what you are advocating, but I have encountered a lot of people in my time in this profession who have advocated for similar things. Almost every time, what they describe as “flexible” was actually formless. What they meant by spontaneity was reactionary. When they advocated against a plan, they were saying they lacked the personal and professional discipline to see a plan to the end.
And they failed… every one of them.