Practice of strategic approach use to management of small towns development in Russia

The article studies the experience of strategic approach use to management small towns development in Russia. To achieve significant positive changes in the level of social and economic development of small towns, high-quality formulation and effective implementation of strategic planning documents are necessary. The aim of the article is to identify the features and practice of strategic approach use to management of small towns development in Russia exemplified by the city of Myshkin (Yaroslavl region) and the city of Belogorsk (Amur region). General scientific methods of synthesis, analysis, as well as classification and statistical analysis were used. The authors summarized approaches to the classification of small towns according to three criteria: function, economic resource, agglomeration type. It was determined that in direct dependence on the state of social and economic development of small towns, about 26 million people live, what is 18% of the population of Russia. We analyzed experience in strategic management and evaluated the content characteristics of the quality of strategies in the examples of Myshkin and Belogorsk. It was established that in terms of strategy to use an exclusively “typical approach” is not so effective, since individual growth points must be identified in each city, which modern strategizing tools (SWOT, PEST, SNW analysis, BigData, etc.) help to find. An important direction should be a strategic approach to the development of small towns in order to ensure the interconnection and interrelation of the main instruments of strategic planning and social and economic development at all levels, presented in the paper in the form of a variety of documents. The practical significance of this study lies in the fact that the provisions, conclusions and proposals made in it can be used by local authorities in dealing with issues of strategic management of small towns development.