Planning

is the process of thinking about and organizing the activities required to achieve a desired goal.
Planning involves the creation and maintenance of a plan. As such, planning is a fundamental
property of intelligent behavior. This thought process is essential to the creation and refinement
of a plan, or integration of it with other plans; that is, it combines forecasting of developments
with the preparation of scenarios of how to react to them.
An important, albeit often ignored aspect of planning, is the relationship it holds with
forecasting. Forecasting can be described as predicting what the future will look like, whereas
planning predicts what the future should look like.
[1]
The counterpart to planning is spontaneous
order.

What is Planning
The process of planning includes the determination of objectives and outlining the future actions
that are needed to achieve these objectives. Various steps that are followed in the process of
planning are:
(i) Identifying the problem: It involves the identification of the aim for the fulfillment of which the
plan is being formulated. If a new plan is require or the modification of an existing plan could help
in achieving these aims.
(ii) Gathering information about the activities involve: An effective plan needs complete
knowledge of the activities involved and their effect on other external and internal activities.
(iii) Analysis of information: This information is then analysed minutely and the information
related with similar subjects is classified so that similar type of data can be kept together.
(iv) Determining alternate plans: There are alternate plans available for the achievement of the
objectives and ingenuity and creativeness are required as some plans are also developed at this
stage.
(v) Selecting the plan: At this stage the plan which is acceptable to the operating personnel is
proposed. The adaptability and the cost of the plan are also taken into consideration.
(vi) Detailed sequence and timing: Detailed like who will perform which activity under the plan
and the time within which the plan should be carried out is determining in this step.
(vii) Progress check of the plan: The provisions are made for the follow up of the plan as the
success of any plan can be measured by the results only.
Types of Objectives for Planning

Routine
Some objectives don't have a specific time frame but deal with expected results from routine, continuous
activities. Normal production levels translate into routine objectives. Monitoring safety to prevent the
accident rate from rising involves routine objectives. Such objectives typically remain at a constant rate.
Management monitors routine objectives for deviations from the norm and to institute corrective action if
necessary. Planning specifies routine objectives and assumes the company will meet them as it has in the
past.
Development
While time-related objectives deal with normal activities within a time frame and routine objectives deal
with regular activities, development objectives result from new initiatives. External change imposed on a
business or internal changes motivated by new goals result in planning for new development. Such plans
specify new activities and estimate the results. These desired results translate into objectives at the various
organizational levels. Since the activities are new, the objectives may not be realistic and managers have
to be ready to make adjustments to this type of objective.

Companies, large or small, can identify problems and establish overall goals for their business, but they need
specific plans to make progress. The planning stage includes courses of action and identifies the results that the
company wants to see. These results translate into objectives at the different levels of the organization. A department
manager may have the objective to increase sales by 10 percent. This becomes an objective of selling 15 more
systems this month for one of his employees. To maintain planning clarity, the type of objective must remain the
same throughout this translation down the organization.


Planning Hierarchy
The concept of the feeling of the plans at the different hierarchical levels can be understood a great
deal with the help of the planning hierarchy. Here the different plans are treated as the hierarchy,
involves going towards the lowest hierarchical plan from the broader hierarchical plan. The
planning hierarchy mainly consists of the following type of the plans -
1. Business plans These types of the plans include whole of the business.
2. SBU plans These plans act as the strategic business unit plans including the business units.
3. Corporate Plans These plans act as the plans of the organization involving its activities. It is
the total plan for the whole organization, a corporate body working as a functional unit. The
complete unit is covered under such plans.
4. Departmental plans These plans are also referred to as the functional unit plans and cover the
branches, the projects, the departments, the units that are separated for the functional efficiency.
Strategic Planning
The process of developing a mission and long range planning objectives and determining in
advance how they will be accomplished.
Operational Planning
The process of setting short- range objectives and determining in advance how they will be
accomplished