Comparison Between Planning and Design School

‘Strategy is the direction and scope of an organisation over the long term, which achieves advantage in a changing environment through it’

Planning consists of competitive moves and business approaches developed to attract, please customers, conduct operations, grow the business, gain competitive advantage, and achieve performance objectives (Huidan, 2011). There are three steps to planning. A manager must be able to decide what goals to pursue, the best strategy to achieve those goals, and how to use their available resources to achieve those goals as efficient as possible (Bethel University,

Strategy is a set of complicated tactics formulated by the executives of a company directed towards the achievement of company’s goal (Salmela, 2002). It is about all the path ways that a company would follow to reach its ultimate goal. It is a company’s strategy which helps to identify what it does better than the other companies in the industries, which may be different from what it does best. For successful strategy formulation and implementation, a company should know the needs of customers and should have knowledge of its competitors. Through a good strategy a company would identify that opportunity which makes it different from the others (Thompson, 2005).

The planning process begins with a situation analysis of the external and internal forces affecting the organization.  This examination helps identify and diagnose issues and problems and may bring to the surface alternative goals and plans for the firm.  Next, the advantages and disadvantages of these goals and plans should be evaluated against one another.  Once a set of goals and a plan have been selected, implementation involves communicating the plan to employees, allocating resources, and making certain that other systems such as rewards and budgets are supporting the plan.  Finally, planning requires instituting control systems to monitor progress toward the goals.

Mintzberg, H. Research . (1972) On strategy-making', Proceedings of the 32nd Annual Meeting of the Academyo f Management,N Minneapolis.

Strategic planning can dictate the success of any organization if properly planned as well as the failure of an organization if not implemented as planned. Strategic planning is all about making choices. It is a process designed to support leaders in being intentional about their goals and methods. Simply stated, strategic planning is a management tool, and like any management tool, it is used for one purpose only—to help an organization do a better job. This portion of the strategic plan will explain why an

For a goal-oriented person, a strategic plan can set direction and serves as a template for consistent decision making that moves the organization toward its envisioned future (Zuckerman, 2013). On the other hand, Zuckerman (2013), poses a different perspective that states that strategic planning may not be strategic after all, becomes as I explained before, it can become a checklist technique that lacks innovative practices. However, the outcome of the strategic planning process relates further to the mission and vision of those who are developing the strategies than in the planning within itself. Therefore, the reality is that strategic planning can be as straightforward and complex as an organization wants it to be. Therefore, if an organization envisions growth, the proposal needs to provoke that, and if a team is only planning to organize itself; then, the plan can be subtler. Therefore, organization can review plans as often as yearly and can last as long as five

Strategy is defined as a plan of action designed to achieve a major objective. This is the overall operations to achieve a goal. During war the military has tactics which come from the art of planning. A strategy is the guide for the individual, business, or organization to achieve the objective at hand. An individual should map out and meditate in advance to reduce the chance of failing. So, for FedEx, it could be to map out routes to make sure delivery personal does not overlap each other. A strategy is a compass that guides a person along to make sure they achieve their objective.

Mintzberg further states that the strategy-making process should include summarizing the data that the manager has acquired from all sources and then synthesizing that data into a vision of the path which the company should follow (Mintzberg, 1994). He continues his ideas by stating that “Planners should make their contribution around the strategy-making process rather than inside it” (Mintzberg, 1994, p. 108). He believes that the planner should not be the one creating the plan, but rather the one who supplies the needed analysis, or data, to the strategic thinkers. An analogy that comes to mind is in my previous job whereby the exceptions processing representatives were a type of advanced data entry representatives. Not only would they extrapolate the data received, but they were also required to forward it to the proper department for processing. They did not make any decision on how to use the data, but instead, directed that data to the group that

Strategic planning involves making decisions about the organization’s long-term goals and strategies and how the organization decides to implement their goals (Bateman, Snell, Konopaske, pg. 113). Strategies help organizations to have a clear perspective on how to go about accomplishing the goals they have in place. All organizations have a clear vision of what their mission and purpose as a company is, they know how to fulfill the mission, vision, and purpose and they know how to ensure that they accomplish all their goals. However, the route the organization takes to define these things determines how effective they will be.

Planning is considered to be a primary function of management. All organisations operate in a complex, dynamic and competitive business environment, and therefore, have to plan their actions without which they may not be able to survive.

Planning is a process of establishing a mission with clear goals as a means to achieve them. Good planning requires special skills and perspectives allowing decision-makers to understand the challenges they are facing and apply the most effective solution to a problem. In order to achieve success, one must plan accordingly. Planning can be short term or long term. Short term plans are done on daily basis and are easier to achieve than long term plans. Long term plans are also known as strategic plans and are used to achieve a long range vision or mission of a company. In both methods of planning, short term and long term, is necessary to achieve top notch results. Like in any other process, there are both benefits and pitfalls to a

According to literature, strategic planning is vital for strategic management. Burgelman (1994) points that strategic planning is a process which decides how, when and who is going to plan and how the results will be implemented. Drucker (1974) identified that the planning for an organization’s future that includes setting major overall objectives, the determination of basic approaches to be used in

Design school clearly separates formulation from implementation. Thus formulator has nothing to do with the implementation and implementers just have to follow the strategy given to them. CEO has already had problems of delegating responsibilities to staff. Hence even if good strategy is formed, poor implementation leads to failure of strategy. Design school encourages strategists to simplify the strategy which restricts their thinking and learning abilities. Thus design school gives a good framework for strategy building but fails to give the required path for success. (Ansoff, 1991)

Managers and organisations plan because it provides them with some direction and reduces uncertainty within the firm. It is also used to set standards for controlling, it is therefore very important within organisations. (Robbins, Bergman, Stagg & Coulter et al, 2006)