The five-year strategic plan was developed in State Fiscal Year (SFY) 2020 and SFY21 with an implementation period of SFY22 through SFY26. The planning process generated the agency's focus areas, goals, objectives, activities, and core values. 

During SFY24, or year three of implementation, the leadership team held regular check-ins on strategic plan progress. To increase staff involvement and provide feedback channels, each of the four directors and the deputy executive director partnered with a staff member on a key initiative. The executive director led the strategic plan check-ins throughout the year, one of which included the staff partners.

The following paragraphs describe progress made in SFY24 toward activities identified in the year three dashboard. The strategic plan goal associated with each activity is given in parentheses after the name of each activity in bold. The leadership team documented progress on the strategic plan using the Asana project management tool.

• Model Roadmap (Sector Leadership). The agency achieved a milestone with the February 2024 public release of its Travel Demand Model (TDM23), the first such release in CTPS history. To date, more than 20 researchers, consultants, and peer agencies, including the Massachusetts Association of Regional Planning Agencies, have received TDM23. Old Colony Planning Council and Southeastern Regional Planning and Economic Development District are both working towards using TDM23 as their modeling platform, representing a significant improvement in the efficiency and consistency of modeling practice in Massachusetts. A comprehensive model roadmap was developed that maps out the full lifecycle of modeling needs, including travel demand modeling. The team created an interactive summary report available on the user guide site that enables users to interact with the model outputs without modeling software, understanding high-level responses of the model.

• External Presentations (Sector Leadership). The agency enhanced its professional development approach by strategically identifying conference opportunities while continuing to respond to individual staff requests. A new requirement was established for staff to share their professional development experiences through various formats, including blog posts, meeting presentations, or written summaries. In addition, the leadership team committed to quarterly reviews of professional development opportunities from a financial perspective and to ensure that conference attendance is spread across teams.

• Career Fairs, Internships, Pipeline (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion). Some SFY24 steps taken in support of this initiative include leveraging university programs, advertising co-op/internship opportunities directly, and discussing the creation of a general internship listing on the agency website or governmentjobs.com. The initial focus was on Northeastern co-ops and the steps necessary to be competitive for those students. Also under consideration is listing co-ops in the agency budget with the opportunity for staff to make requests. It is possible that leadership may recommend co-ops as the multiyear planning process evolves.

• Technical Assistance (Programs and Services). The agency has been reimagining the structure and focus of the technical assistance program, shifting from a mode-specific approach to a broader thematic framework aligned with the goals of the Long-Range Transportation Plan. Examples of topics explored include applying a regional approach, expanding areas of work, elevating technical assistance, developing a strategy for funding, supporting quick builds, and creating resources and guidebooks.

• Project Management (Programs and Services). The Project Management Working Group (PMWG) was re-launched with a structured year-long engagement plan featuring regular meetings designed to ensure diverse cross-team participation and improve agency-wide project management practices. Example topics discussed include project initiation, project management styles and approaches, and ideas on training content. Members of the PMWG conducted focus groups, interviews, and team meetings to obtain staff input across the agency. The working group also recommended that project feedback become part of the project closeout process to allow comments from staff, external partners, stakeholders, and clients to be incorporated regularly.

• Contract Expansion Pilot/SS4A (Programs and Services). The agency started the Safe Streets and Roads for All (SS4A) project funded through a federal discretionary grant. Actions included working through the procurement with the Metropolitan Area Planning Council (MAPC), hiring the consultants, contracting with the federal government, and navigating the state funding match and invoicing process. As part of this grant, the agency also launched a number of new initiatives, including establishing a task force with a broad range of stakeholders, creating a structure for compensating advocates for their work, and engaging in policy-related research. The SS4A grant has served as the agency’s pilot experience with a grant of this scale.

• Web Improvements (Sector Leadership). The agency began transitioning web editing responsibilities to the IT team and planned for expanded web support through a full-time web administrator position. The position was posted in June 2024.

• New Office Space and Move (Organizational Structure and Staffing). To explore potential lease options, including the procurement of new office space, the agency identified required and preferred office attributes. A commercial real estate consultant used these criteria to identify sample spaces near the agency’s current office. Next, the agency engaged a legal firm to assist in developing a Request for Proposals for new office space. Internally, some initial research was performed on the differences between public records and project archives with respect to requirements and the goal of reducing paper files and cabinets prior to any potential move.

• Staff Skill Building (Programs and Services; Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion). Leadership team members engaged in ongoing coordination and collaboration related to topics like project management training and DEIA training, as well as mandated training requirements for anti-harassment.

• MPO Board Orientation (Governance). The agency prepared board orientation materials, moving the content from outline form into a slide deck. Several audience-specific and content-specific modules are in development, such as those for the LRTP planning process, the TIP, agency staff, and so forth. The initial slide deck is intended for new MPO Board members; future modules may be presented to current members.

• DEI Committee and Training (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion). At the start of the state fiscal year, the agency published a statement on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) that was created by staff with the support of the MAPC director of equity and culture. A small group of staff continued to meet and discuss how to most effectively implement diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility (DEIA) practices within the agency, ultimately recommending training for the DEIA Working Group, which started in SFY24. In addition, the working group recommended exporting initial discovery/research.

• Staff Orientation Process (Organizational Structure and Staffing). The staff orientation process was formalized and migrated to Asana to better track each new hire's onboarding experience. Responsibilities were formalized, and each new hire’s Asana is now managed by the HR team with significant input from the hiring manager. Key changes in SFY24 were to first-day activities, which were reordered to increase time for technology onboarding and in-person interaction, and adding an introduction to MPOs early in new employees’ tenure. In addition, the practice of matching each new hire with an orientation peer was established. An orientation peer serves as a supplemental sounding board and Q&A resource for recent hires.

• Human Resource Audit and Improvements (Organizational Structure and Staffing). Review of processes, procedures, and offerings continued with a benefits survey and staff engagement survey in SFY24 along with benefit and policy adjustments related to adding a new holiday (Friday after Thanksgiving), sick leave revisions (no waiting period, ability to carry a negative sick-time balance, and broadening of the range of persons for whom employees can use sick time to care for), increase in professional membership reimbursement dollars, and revised employee classification descriptions. Following an introduction to the concept by MAPC, longer-term planning is underway to explore the feasibility of implementing an HR business partner model, which is an approach that actively aligns human resources staff with departments to help advance organizational goals.

• Fiduciary Agreement (Organizational Structure and Staffing). The agency continued to develop and discuss elements of the fiduciary agency agreement appendix with its fiduciary agent and partner, MAPC. The fiduciary agreement defines the business and shared services that are purchased from and with MAPC. There are several general categories of services: finance, procurement, human resources, and legal. In addition, the two agencies collaborated on a range of operational and workflow improvements to explore.

• Communication Plans (Marketing and Public Presentation). The agency documented its logo guidelines for staff with information on how to present the agency's logo, colors, and typography in a consistent way across all channels. The design direction proposal milestone was instituted to provide a preview for the executive leadership team of the design and layout for select project and program publications. Following the rollout of the transportation finance initiative, staff on the Communications and Engagement team began preparing mini-communication plans and campaigns to better coordinate planning and cross-team collaboration, with an emphasis on investing in the LinkedIn platform both for messaging and recruiting. Research and design sprint projects also took place to begin to identify additional shareable resources to bring to all staff.

• Branding Consultant (Marketing and Public Presentation). The agency prepared the rationale for and successfully requested deobligated funds to engage a branding consultant on an organizational identity and branding project for the agency.