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INTEGRATED PLANNING

Planning within an organization is not just a matter of making a budget and then giving each area of the organization its "numbers." Planning means taking the vision and the global strategies for reaching it and putting together the plans for actually working the strategies. These plans will include both business and operational planning and will involve several time frames.

Business and Operation Planning

For any Strategic Plan to actually become a reality, both Business and Operational Plans must be made. (Before reading further, you may want to read the LazCast article on Strategic Planning.) Some organizations make their Business and Operational Plans simultaneously while others opt to focus on them individually.

A Business Plan is a picture of WHAT must happen in each of the Seven Critical Business Areas of the Organization in order to implement the Strategic Plan.

An Operational Plan is an instruction guide for HOW the Business Plan actually will be worked or made to happen across the organization and HOW it will be monitored for needed changes.

Just as Strategic Plans will not happen without Business Plans, so Business Plans will not happen without Operational Plans. Thus the global organization must have a business plan for WHAT must be done with the whole to make the Strategic Plan workable. Likewise, each business unit, region or department (depending on the size and structure of the organization) must have a business plan for WHAT must be done within its sphere to make the global business plan workable. And finally, each smaller unit, team or group must have a business plan for WHAT must happen within its sphere to make the business plan of the next larger area workable. This same process will apply to Operational Plans - they must be made for the whole and then within each sphere of influence.

NOTE!! It is urgent, however, that no planning be done without adequate assessment work. Plans built on faulty or inaccurate data will result in each sphere making plans that are not workable or simply choosing not to make plans because they realize that any resulting plans would be useless and thus the effort a waste of time. When most people have more to do to keep the organization running than they can handle, taking time to make unworkable plans just doesn't make sense. Good assessment work involves all spheres of the organization in all Seven Critical Business Areas so that plans, as they radiate out across the organization) are based on good data and are thus workable and able to be operationalized.

So for planning to be integrated across the organization, it must happen in every sphere of influence throughout the organization. The following graphic will illustrate this PERVASIVE NATURE OF INTEGRATED PLANNING.

Time Frames of Planning

Integrated Planning also requires an understanding of the time frames under which things must happen. Planning is often divided into groups according to the length of time the plan will cover. As we will see a little later, the planning process is basically the same regardless of length of time for implementation. However, thinking about planning according to its time frame is useful since planning, in some ways, should be sequential or chronological. In other words, we will make our long-range plans first, our intermediate plans second, our short term plans third, our immediate plans fourth, and our daily plans last. If we are utilizing planning to its fullest, each set of plans will grow from the previous set so those plans with a shorter time frame are contributing to the realization of those that will take longer.

1. STRATEGIC (LONG TERM) PLANS (Usually covers two+ years.)

2. INTERMEDIATE PLANS (Usually covers six months to two+ years.)

3. SHORT-TERM PANS (Usually covers one to six months.)

4. MONTHLY PLANS (Usually covers one week to one month.)

5. DAILY PLANS (Usually covers one to six days)

Every group within the organization must make long term, intermediate, short term, monthly, and daily plans.

In practice in an organization, this sequence of planning might look like the following graphic.

In traditional organizations, the various types of planning are done by those in corresponding positions. It usually looks something like this:

Executive group = Strategic planning

Management group = Intermediate planning

Supervisory group = Short term and sometimes monthly planning

Team Leaders = Monthly and weekly planning

Employees = Weekly and daily planning

In traditional organizations, the type of planning each group does is consistent with the amount and nature of the information it has. Thus executives, who have the most global information, do strategic planning; managers, who have the most area specific information, do intermediate planning; supervisors, who have the most operational information, do short term planning; team leaders, who have the most immediate need and scheduling information, make monthly plans; and employees, who have the most work specific information, do daily and weekly planning.

Since these various types of planning are not usually integrated well, strategic plans are made that are not easily implemented, and daily plans are made that do not always reflect the priorities of the organization.

The organization's global strategic plan is developed by a group of organization members who are chartered with attending to the global good of the organization. This group uses data from all across the organization. All subsequent planning of all types is done with achieving the strategic plan as the focus. Thus every business unit, area, or team makes its business and operational plans with short-term plans, monthly plans, weekly plans, and daily plans with achieving the strategic plan as the goal. The strategic plans of the organization will only be realized if every sphere understands the global vision and contributes to its realization.

The Dynamic Nature of Planning

In a collaborative environment, the planning process is an on-going, high involvement, high priority process. Planning is not viewed as something we do if we happen to have the time. Planning is the foundation on which everything after the vision is built. Planning is multi-layered and on going and dynamic. It is not a one time or once a year event. The global planning process for an organization is also the organization development process - the plans for WHAT and HOW it will use to develop itself from where it is to where it wants to be.

All other planning within the organization will spring from this global plan for the organization. Without this global plan, business and operational plans will lack direction and focus and are unlikely to contribute to operationalizing the organization's strategies or to realizing its vision. Ongoing changes to these global plans will lead to adjustments in business and operational plans. Just as ongoing problems with the implementation of global plans within any sphere will lead to a reevaluation of the global plans.

For a healthy culture and a successful business, planning throughout the organization must be tightly integrated, so that necessary adjustments are easy to make and complementary to all those impacted.

Questions? Comments? We would love to hear from you.
Drop us a line at info@lazarusconsulting.com .