PLANNING
When designing an environment for the effective performance of individuals working together in groups, a mangers most essential task is to see that every one understands the group’s purposes and objectives and the methods of obtaining them. If group effort is to be effective, people must know what they want to accomplish. This is the function of planning and it’s the most basic of all the managerial functions. Planning is the first managerial function used to pursue organizational goals. Planning involves selecting missions and objectives and actions to achieve them; it requires decision making process, that is, choosing from among alternative courses of action. Plans thus provide a rational approach to pre-selected objectives. Planning also implies managerial innovation. Therefore it’s important to understand what goals are and how they differ from objectives. Goals are the broad term accomplishments an organization wishes to attain. Objectives on the other hand are specific, short-term tasks that must be completed to achieve the goals. Therefore, planning involves determining the goals of the organization and evolving ways of achieving these goals in a systematic manner. Planning bridges the gap from where we are to where we want to go. It makes it possible for things to occur which would not have otherwise happened. Although factors beyond our control may interfere with our plans, it’s important that we plan otherwise we shall be leaving events to chance, because planning is an intellectually demanding process which requires to consciously determine courses of action to base our decisions on purpose, knowledge and considered estimates. 
Planning answers three fundamental questions for the business:
1.	What is the situation now? What is the state of the economy? What are the existing opportunities for meeting peoples needs? What products and customers are more profitable? Why do people buy (or not buy) our products? Who are our major competitors?
2.	Where do we want to go? How much do we want? What is our profit goal? What are our social objectives? What are our personal development objectives for employees?
3.	How can we get there from here? This is the most important part of planning and it takes three forms. ie: 
(a)	Strategic (long-range) planning determines the major goals of the organization and how to achieve those goals. At this stage the company decides which customers to serve, what products/services to sell and the geographical areas to compete.
(b)	Tactical (short-range) planning is the process for developing detailed, short-term decisions about what is to be done, who is to do it and how it is to be done. Tactical planning is done by lower level managers where as strategic planning top-level managers of the firm do. 
(c)	Contingent planning is preparation of alternative courses of action that may be used if the primary plans do not achieve the objectives of the organization. 
The need for planning (Why do we plan)
Every one in the organization makes some kind of plan, whether you are for a meeting, burial or a party or in a course of producing something, there will be some kind planning and in most cases, its poor planning rather than lack of it that brings poor results. 
Planning involves establishing of goals and therefore a process of deciding where we want to go. Organizations are established for various purposes like a view of making profits, meeting customer needs. Providing employment, growing and serving a multiplicity of other objectives. Therefore this calls for planning in order to meet such purposes.
There is also a need for planning because organizations are set up in environment that differ and most environments are dynamic with socio-political changes and technological changes taking place every day especially in third world countries where' political instability, famines and natural disasters are common and it therefore becomes difficult to set objectives.
•	Planning enables us to establish systematic and rational procedures of doing things by looking into the uncertain future using various planning techniques.
•	Planning enables us to set realistic goals that have been thought out properly by enabling us zero in on those aspects that are possible within constraints of the environment.
•	Planning enables us to predict future events with some degree of certainty by identifying factors that may affect our intended goals and find solutions to such factors in order to achieve those objectives.
•	Planning enables us to determine well in advance how we are going to do things we have envisaged to do.
The importance of planning in organizations
In organizations, planning is the process of setting goals and choosing the means of achieving these goals. There planning at organizations is important in the following ways;
i)	Without planning, managers cannot know how to organize people and resources effectively and they may not even have a clear idea of what they need to organize.
ii)	Without plans, managers cannot lead with confidence or expect others to follow them.
iii)	Without plans, managers and their followers have little chance of achieving their goals or knowing when and where they stray from their path.
iv)	Without plans, controlling becomes an exercise in futility (having no purpose because there is no chance of success)
Who plans?
Planning takes place all the time at all levels in the originations, it may be conscious or not. Every body in the organization will think out his work on a day-to-day basis or longer. Workers on the shop floor will every morning decide on what these are going to do depending on what has been assigned to them by their foremen. Normally lower level managers and the operators or clerks plan with in the framework of broad plans given by their immediate superiors. Middle level managers also plan within the framework of broad plans given by their superiors. It’s therefore evident that everybody in the organization plans and what differs is the time scale of planning or types of plans. Top management tends to plan for longer period, which is normally referred to as strategic planning or corporate planning. It’s of about a period of one to three or five years. Middle level management tends to plan within a time frame of one year normally scale usually ranging from one to twelve months. Lower level managers plan on a more short time scale usually weeks to several months. Operatives plan on lesser time scale ranging from day to several days or weeks. 
Types of plans 
The failure of some managers to recognize that there are a number of different plans has often caused difficulty in making planning effective. It’s easy to see that a major program such as building and equipping a new factory is a plan, but it’s difficult to realize that a number of future courses of actions are also plans. In fact, a plan can encompass any future course of future action. To clearly show that plans are of many different types, they are classified as; (1) purposes or missions, (2) objectives, (3) strategies, (4) policies, (5) procedures, (6) rules, (7) programs, and (8) budgets. However, within some organizations, plans are arranged in a hierarchy that parallels the organizational structure. At each level, plans serve two functions (i) objectives to be met by plans at lower level, and (ii) the means for achieving the objectives set at the next higher level. 
This therefore reveals that there are two main types of plans (1) Strategic plans: designed to meet the broad objectives of the organization and (2) Operational plans: which provide the details of how strategic plans will be accomplished.
1. Strategic plans.
Organizations have a long-term vision of what they want to achieve and where they want to go. These intentions call for long-term plans or corporate plans. These plans are about three to five years but some organizations have longer period plans say up to ten years. However plans exceeding three years are not advisable due to the volatile nature of our environment and the terminology strategic plans replaces of long term plans. Strategic plans therefore define broadly where the organization wants to be in the future.
2. Operational plans 
Operational plans are derivative plans, they are plans derived from strategic plans giving details of specific objectives that will be achieved in given time. These are plans for usually one year. However they may range between six (6) to eighteen (18) months. They are plans which detail out the operations to be undertaken to achieve objectives. Operational plans are divided into two main types i.e. Single use plans; which are developed to achieve specific purposes and are dissolved when the purpose has been accomplished, and ii) Standing plans: which are standardized approaches for handling recurrent and predictable situations.
i) Single-use plans
These are detailed courses of action that probably will not be repeated in the same firm in future for example if a hotel planning to set up a new branch because its expanding rapidly, it will need a single-use plan for that project even though it has established a number of other branches in the past. It will not be able to use an existing hotel plan because the projected branch presents unique requirements of location, construction costs, labor availability, zoning restrictions and so forth. The major types of single-use plans are Programs, Projects and Budgets. 
Programs; a program covers a relatively large set of activities. It shows i) the major steps required to reach an objective. ii) The organization unit or members responsible for each step and. iii) the order and timing of each step. This program may be accompanied by a budget or set of budgets or the activities required.
Projects; projects are the smaller and separate portions of programs; each project has limited scope and distinctive directives concerning assignments and time. An example of hotel typical projects might include the preparation of a layout, report on labor availability and recommendation for procuring items for the new branch. Each project will become the responsibility of designated personnel who will be given specific resources and deadlines.
Budgets; budgets are statements of financial resources set aside for specific activities in a given period of time. They arc primarily devices to control organizations activities and so are important components of programs and projects. Budgets itemize income and expenditure and this provide target for such activities as sales, departmental expenses or new investments. Budgets are considered single use because managers use it as a process by which decisions are made to commit resources to various courses of action, therefore it becomes the key planning process by which other activities are chosen and coordinated.
ii) Standing plans
These are the standardized approaches of handling recurrent and predictable situations, It may be difficult to visualize these as plans even as single use in the sense that a plan is a future course of action and is usually associated with committing of organizational resources, so as to achieve certain objectives. However, standing plans include; Policies, Standard procedures and Rules. They are called so because they guide action, thinking and decision over an activity that will be undertaken. Standard plans are therefore activities that are usually repetitive.

Whenever organizational activities occur repeatedly, a single decision or set of decisions can effectively guide those activities when standing plans are established, they allow managers to conserve time used for planning and decision making because similar situations are handled in predetermined manner. For example a bank can more easily approve or reject a loan request/application if criteria are established in advance to evaluate credit ratings/worthiness e.g. collateral assets and applicants' available information. The major types of standing plans are policies, standard procedures and rules.
Policies; a policy is a general guidelines for decision-making. It sets out boundaries around decisions including those that can be made and shutting out those that cannot. Some policies deal with very important matters like those requiring strict sanitary conditions where food or drugs are produced or packaged. Others may be concerned with relatively minor issues like employees dressing codes. Policies are usually established formally and deliberately by top managers because they feel will i) improve the effectiveness of the organization. ii) Reflect their personal values to the organization and iii) clear up the confusion that may occur at lower levels.
Standard procedures; policies are carried out by means of more detailed guidelines called “standard procedures”. A procedure provides detailed set of instructions for performing a sequence of actions that occur often. For example a hotel may have a policy or “refunds made with a smile on failure to use our services within two hours notice of purchase”. The procedure for employees who handle such queries are likely or expected to have a series of steps like these; i) smile at a customer, ii) check the receipt for purchase time, iii) check reasons for failure to use the facilities and so on. 
Rules; rules are statements that a specific action must or must not be taken in a given situation. They are the most explicit of standing plans and are not guides to thinking or decision-making. Rather they are substitutes for them the only choice a rule leaves is whether to or not to apply it to a particular set of circumstances. E.g. it may be a rule that all employees are supposed to work until five 0 'clock. In other words they are either dos or don’ts.
	
THE HIERACHY OF ORGANISATIONAL PLANS

GOALS

Rules

Standard Procedures

Policies

Projects

Programmes 

Standing plans

Single-use plans

Operational plans

Strategic plans

Budg
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The Planning process 
Before a manager can actually undertake any organizations activity, its important that the activity is planned, making decisions on what, when, how and who is to do what. This shows the purpose and the direction for the organization. Planning is quite straightforward and it can be conducted following various steps. However different authors give various steps in the planning process for instance, James A. F. Stoner and Charles Wankel look at the basic four planning steps which can be adapted at all planning activities at all organizational levels as i) establish the goals, ii) define the present situation, iii) determine aids and barriers, iv) develop a set of actions, while Koontz looks at eight steps in the planning process but the number doesn’t really mater, what is important is that the issues you go through are all the same and are as follows:

Steps in planning
1.	Scanning the environment; whether it’s a new business or an on going business, scanning the environment is the first step. If it's a new business, it involves looking out for opportunities that will turn the business in to a reality and for an on going business, it calls for assessing both the environment and the business itself if its taking advantage of the existing opportunities offered by the environment, this is important because it gives a reflection on whether the business is on track and whether new opportunities have emerged that did not exist before.
2.	Establishing objectives/goals; after scanning the environment. We can go ahead to establish the organizational goals. Organizational goals are the broad aims. They are the intentions of the organization and provide the basic sense of direction that forms the activities of the organization. The term goal includes the organizational purpose, mission and objectives. Goal is a broad term and will indicate what is to be achieved. Purposes of an organization are the primary roles of the organization in the society, thus broadly defined aims. For instance commercial banks can be given their usual functions of mobilizing savings, lending money etc. these functions are applicable to all commercial banks and all these hanks share that goal or purpose. Organizational mission is a "unique aim", this unique aim is why a particular organization exists, the reason that sets it apart from others of its type, and therefore no two organizations can have a similar mission, though the wording of a mission for two organizations may be similar.
Organizational objectives are specific targets derived from the mission. They are usually quantitative. Setting organizational goals is the first step that gives or defines what exactly the organization is planning to do and what it hopes to achieve. This is very important since deployment of organizational resources will respond to this goal definition.

For an existing organization, the process really involves assessing whether we are achieving our existing goals or not if not why? What are gaps and what do we do? Is it necessary to review the goals, reduce them or amend them? Should they be abandoned or not. This hinges (depends) a lot on the environmental factors. Are the goals achievable given the environmental factors?
3.	Premising; (assumptions about the future) the third step in planning is to establish propositions from forecast data. This involves making forecasts of events and scanning forecast data from which propositions are established, this step also involves assessing the present situation both in terms of the organization and also the environmental conditions. Propositions can be made if the environment is known. Having established the goals and objectives showing what we want to achieve, we must make assumptions about what is likely to happen. For instance we may assume that inflation and interest rates may be at certain level in the future this then enables mangers to predict the activities to be undertaken in the organization. Forecasts are not only made about the external environment but also about the environment internal to the organization.
4.	Determining alternative courses of action; when goals have been selected and we know what we are required to achieve and how to achieve them or change them, and then the various ways of achieving the goals can be determined. These are the strategies, policies and tactics. This is a stage of analysis. It involves using various analysis tools and skills to generate the different courses of action. Strategies are broad programs to achieve goals. Policies guide thinking and action, while tactics are operational decisions aimed at efficient resource utilization. As many courses of action as possible are generated to give a full dimension of the range of opportunities available.
5.	Evaluating the various alternative courses; having generated the different alternatives, the next step is to analyze and evaluate each in light of the available resources and objectives. This involves anticipating what will happen if you take one particular course of action. The necessary factors are examined and likely out comes predicted. At this stage also, scanning the environment and forecasting will be done various tools and techniques are used both qualitative and quantities are available for the purpose.
6.	Selecting the best and practical course of action: this is the actual point of adopting a plan or selecting a strategy, the point of decision-making. As already said, a plan is predetermined course of action. It’s a process of deciding by selecting one alternative among many. At this stage you actually select the strategic plan if the process is at top level and operational plan at other lower levels.
7.	Formulating derivative plans: Once the basic plan has been made derivative plans to support it must be made. If the plan was strategic, the operational plans will have to be made; plans for each sub unit in the organization like production, finance, Personnel and so on will also have to be made. For an organization with branches sub units may be branches and also sub plans within the branches.
8.	Numbering plans by budgeting: budgeting is the final step in the planning process. Budgets are said to be quantitative expression of plans. They actually give meaning to plans as they show where the financial commitment is to be made. The overall plan is reflected with a master budget and the departmental budget reflects the derivative plans.
9.	Implementation; after drawing budgets and resources are allocated, implementations must take place.
10.	Monitoring and evaluation; after the plans have been implemented, then follow-up must be made to check on the consistency and deviations.