The planning or planning is an action that is linked to to plan . This verb, on the other hand, consists of make a plan .
Through planning, a person or organization is set some goal and stipulates what steps you should take to get there. In this process, which can have a very variable duration depending on the case, various issues are considered, such as the resources available and the influence of external situations.
All planning consists of different stages, since it is a process that involves making successive decisions. Frequently, planning begins with the identification of a problem and continues with the analysis of the different options available. The subject or company you must choose the option that is most conducive to solve the problem in question and start the implementation of a plan.
It should be noted that, in a broad sense, planning is done almost every moment, even on a day-to-day basis. For example, when a person decides to take a cab To get to a certain place, you will have planned how to travel faster and effective. However, it can also be done in the long term and with decisions that involve thousands of people, such as the planning carried out in a large multinational corporation.
The characteristics of the planning, of course, will depend on the context; the decision making by a family when organizing a vacation trip is not the same as the process planned by the manager of a company to launch a new product to the market. Nevertheless, its success will depend on the degree of knowledge, analysis and intuition of those who execute it, and in both cases a meticulous plan of action could be given, regardless of the formality of each one.
Some classifications
It is possible to classify planning in different ways, according to expectations temporal, amplitude and specificity. Let's see some examples below:
* Strategic planning: the managers of a company, to analyze internal and external factors and its impact on the objectives of the company. It is usually traced in the long term, in general several years, and consists of the detailed design of its insertion in the market, its communication with the media and its advertising campaigns.
* Tactical planning: usually related to short-term decision making, in general to cope with a crisis Unexpected When a product sells less than expected, for example, it is necessary to act, either lowering the price or improving the offer by including accessories or developing packages (bundles). These actions must be in accordance with the strategic plan that was originally drawn.
* Operational planning: refers to the organization of resources and personnel of a company for problem solving. It is essential for every company, since it draws up the action plan and the relationship that the different departments will have with each other for the development of the tasks in a time generally stipulated by the directive department. In work groups composed of a team and its leader, it receives Projects and its corresponding delivery dates, and decides how to proceed, which member will be responsible for each task, and so on.
* Normative planning: This is a series of rules and regulations that are created for the proper functioning of a company. From employee attire, to work schedules and breaks, everything must be previously established to ensure that it works in an orderly manner.
* Interactive planning: is the most used by Business They offer technological products. It's based on chart solutions to problems in an ideal future, as well as the path to reach that future. When the tools or infrastructure necessary to achieve certain objectives are not available, the actions necessary to achieve those resources are analyzed.
