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/ Canadian Government Executive
// February 2016
W
hile Dwight D. Eisenhow-
er’s famous remark that
“Plans are nothing, plan-
ning is everything” may
seem a bit radical, it does highlight the key
aspect that the process of planning is more
important than the actual product. While a
plan provides that “stake in the ground” for
monitoring organization performance, the
process of planning provides a mechanism
to support collaboration and consensus
development around the means to achieve
organizational goals. It also informs and
communicates the direction of the organi-
zation to internal and external stakehold-
ers alike.
Technology can play a key role in this
communication and collaboration pro-
cess. It can reduce the labour burden and
time often associated with developing
meaningful plans. It can help all levels of
the organization “see the big picture” and
more importantly, their part in it. Technol-
ogy and supporting data structures, offer
the promise of “one version of the truth”, It
also reduces the time and effort spent on
low-value added activities like gathering
plan information from disparate sources,
continual comparisons/validation of re-
sults, and managing the revision/approval
process.
In a recent survey conducted across the
planning community of a mid-sized feder-
al department, it was estimated that over
40% of the total time spent in planning
and reporting was expended on these
types of low or non-value added activities.
Enterprise technology enablement helps
reduce the effort expended on these items
thereby freeing up more time for the truly
value-added aspects of planning: monitor-
ing, analysis, and decision-making.
Integrated planning is essentially all
about alignment. It involves coordinat-
ing and linking the three often disjointed
components of planning; strategic, opera-
tional, and resource/financial planning.
It also involves the ability to monitor and
report on the expected results derived
in each of these planning processes. The
interdependency between these compo-
nents is shown in Figure 1.
Strategic planning sets the direction for
the organization and establishes longer-
term objectives that help contribute to its
vision and strategic outcomes. The strate-
gy is then aligned to operational planning
which consists of two reciprocal elements;
front-line program/functional planning
and the identification and alignment of
corporate services requirements (i.e. HR,
IM/IT, Procurement). This is ultimately
where the proverbial “rubber hits the
road” as annual work plans are developed
to deliver on the programs and services
necessary to achieve the organizational
vision and mandate.
Finally, available resources (i.e. staff,
assets, operating budgets) need to be bal-
anced and aligned to what is required to
execute on these operational plans. The
Program Planning
Mike
Haley
Using Technology to
Build a New Culture
of Planning
Figure 1.
Planning Process Alignment and Supporting Technolgies