Dr. Shahid Amin Trali
We are in the new year 2019 but we were not at our best in the past. Let’s make strong resolutions to make some big changes now to achieve higher goals and objectives in our life. One big reason for our failures most of the time is our bad approach towards planning. Planning is the first and foremost step to reach to our goals and objectives. Whether you are a student, teacher, athlete, actor, doctor, lawyer, engineer, an individual, family, any business or any organization, setting objectives and trying to achieve them is an important task. We may have different types of goals and objectives with varying degrees of importance and time spans. But, there is one thing that remains common is to devise a plan that will significantly help us to achieve our goals.
Planning is the determination
of a futuristic course of action
We can say planning is an intellectual process. It helps us to decide in advance the ways to deal with the situations, which we are going to face in future. Planning involves logical thinking and rational decision making. It is through planning we can make optimum utilization of all available resources. It’s the planning that aims to give us the highest rewards at the minimum possible cost. Planning increases the overall efficiency of any organization. Modern day organizations face many risks. It’s planning that helps to forecast these risks and gives us better leads to take the necessary precautions to avoid these risks. It prepares individuals and organizations for future uncertainties in advance. Some of the popular organizational theorists and thinkers like Koontz and O’ Donnell suggest that plans are the selected courses along which the management desires to coordinate its group action. Planning also becomes necessary for individuals and organizations to keep a good control. The actual performance is compared with the plans, and deviations (if any) are found out and corrected. It is impossible to achieve such a control without right planning.
We must understand the
essentials of a good planning
Our plans must be based on a clearly-defined objective and must be put in simple words. It is equally important for our plans to be rationale and appropriate and our plans should be comprehensive. In today’s world, organizations face competitive and volatile environment. It is imperative for today’s organizations that they must have flexibility in plans if any unseen events happen. So, tomorrow if a competitor comes with a new strategy, or any factor poses a threat to an existing plan, they will have an answer already in the pipeline in their plan. We must always have a plan ‘B’ and plan ‘C’ to counter any threats. Because of this reason of flexibility, organizations will not panic, but instead they will just pay attention to the execution of their new plans. It is highly important for our plans to be free from social and psychological biases.
Although organizations that use formal planning do not always outperform those that do not plan, but most of the research studies undertaken reveal that there is positive relationships between planning and performance.
There is a great possibility of avoiding failures if we believe in effective planning. When effective planning is adopted, we will have a competitive edge over others who do not plan. It’s the planning that will allow us to convert our targets into fine achievements. The efficiency of our planning will determine whether we will achieve our objectives or not and it will also help us in better utilization of available resources. To conclude let’s plan better now and enjoy happy New Year 2019.
(The autor is Assistant Professor, ITM University Gwalior.)
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