What is a plan? In management science, planning has two meanings. One is planning work, that is, according to the analysis of the external environment and internal conditions of the organization, put forward the organizational goals and ways to achieve them in a certain period of time in the future. The second is the form of plan, which refers to the management events in the form of words and indicators, as well as in different departments and members of the organization, about the future direction, content and mode of action. Whether it is planning work or planning form, planning is based on the needs of society and the ability of the organization itself. Through the preparation, implementation and inspection of the plan, the organization's goals in a certain period of time are determined, and the organization's human, material and financial resources are effectively utilized to coordinate and arrange the organization's activities and achieve the best economic and social benefits. The content of the plan can be simply summarized into six aspects, namely: what to do? Why are you doing this? When will it be done? Where to do it? Who will do it? How did you do it? The abbreviation is "5W 1H". There are many kinds of plans, which can be classified according to different standards. The main classification criteria are: the importance, time limit, clarity and abstraction of planning. However, according to these classification standards, the types of schemes obtained are not independent of each other, but closely related. Such as short-term plan and long-term plan, strategic plan and operation plan. 1. According to the importance of the plan, the plan can be divided into strategic plan and operational plan. A plan applied to the whole organization, which sets the overall goal for the organization and seeks the position of the organization in the environment, is called a strategic plan. A plan that specifies the details of how to achieve the overall goal is called an operating plan. Strategic plan and operational plan are different in time frame, scope and whether they contain a set of known organizational goals. Strategic plans often include continuous time intervals, usually five years or more, covering a wide range of fields without specifying specific details. In addition, an important task of the strategic plan is to set goals; The work plan assumes that the goal already exists, but only provides the methods to achieve it. 2. According to the planning deadline, financial personnel are used to dividing the payback period into long-term, medium-term and short-term. Long-term usually refers to more than 5 years, short-term generally refers to less than 1 year, and medium-term is in between. Managers also use long-term, medium-term and short-term to describe plans. Long-term planning describes the development direction and policy of the organization in a long period of time (usually more than 5 years), stipulates the goals and requirements that all departments of the organization should achieve in a long period of time, and draws a blueprint for the long-term development of the organization. The short-term plan specifies what activities each department of the organization will engage in in in the short period from now to the future, especially in the recent period, and what requirements it will meet to engage in such activities, thus providing a basis for the members of the organization to act in the near future. 3. According to the clarity of the plan content and the clarity index of the plan content, the plan can be divided into specific plans and guiding plans. The specific plan has clear goals and no ambiguity. For example, the sales manager of an enterprise intends to increase the sales of the enterprise by 15% in the next six months, and he will make clear procedures, budget plans and timetables. This is the concrete plan. The guiding scheme only stipulates some general principles and action principles, giving actors greater discretion. It points out the key points, but does not limit the actors to specific goals or specific action plans. For example, a specific plan to increase sales may stipulate that sales will increase by 15% in the next six months, while the guiding plan may only stipulate that sales will increase by 12%~ 16% in the next six months. Compared with the guiding plan, the specific plan is easier to implement, check and control, but it lacks flexibility, and its requirements for clarity and predictability are often difficult to meet. 4. harold koontz and Hein Weihrich divided the plan from abstract to concrete, and divided it into: purpose or mission, goal, strategy, policy, procedure, rules, scheme and budget. 1) purpose or mission It shows the role and position that an organization should play in society. It determines the nature of the organization, and also determines the symbol that distinguishes this organization from other organizations. All kinds of organized activities should at least have their own purpose or mission if they want to make it meaningful. For example, the mission of universities is to teach and educate people and conduct scientific research, the mission of research institutes is scientific research, the mission of hospitals is to cure diseases and save lives, the mission of courts is to interpret and enforce laws, and the purpose of enterprises is to produce and distribute goods and services. 2) The purpose or mission of the target organization is often too abstract, while the principles are too abstract. It needs to be further concretized into the goals of the organization in a certain period of time and the goals of various departments. The mission of the organization dominates the goals of each period and each department. Moreover, the goals of each period and department of the organization are formulated around the mission of the organization and strive to complete the mission of the organization. Although it is the mission of the university to teach, educate and research, when the university completes its mission, it will further clarify the goals of different periods and departments, such as how many talents have been trained and how many papers have been published in the last three years. 3) Strategic strategy is a general plan of actions and resources used to achieve the overall goals of an organization, and its purpose is to determine and convey what kind of organization an organization expects to become through a series of major goals and policies. The strategy is not intended to accurately outline how the organization will achieve its goals, which is the task of countless major and minor support programs. 4) Policy is a comprehensive statement or understanding that guides or conveys decision-making ideas. However, not all policies are statements, and policies are often implicitly reflected in the actions of implementers. For example, the habit of a supervisor to deal with a certain problem is often regarded as a model for subordinates to deal with such problems, which may be a hidden and potential policy. Policies can help to decide the solution to the problem in advance, on the one hand, reducing the cost of dealing with some standard questions in time, on the other hand, unifying other solutions. The policy supports decentralization, and at the same time supports the control of this decentralization by superiors. On the one hand, policies cannot be regarded as rules, on the other hand, this freedom should be restricted to a certain extent. On the one hand, the degree of discretion depends on the policy itself, on the other hand, it depends on the management art of the executors. 5) A program is a plan to formulate necessary methods for handling future activities. It lists in detail the practical methods that some activities must be completed, and arranges the necessary activities in chronological order. Unlike strategy, it is a guide to action, not to thought. Unlike policy, it does not give actors the right to handle it freely. Considering the theoretical research, we can distinguish the policy from the procedure, but in practice, the procedure is often manifested as the policy of the organization. For example, the procedures for manufacturing enterprises to process orders, the financial department to approve credit to customers, and the accounting department to record transactions are all reflected in the policies of enterprises. Every department in the organization has procedures, and at the grassroots level, the procedures are more specific and more numerous. 6) There is no room for discretion in rules and regulations. It clarifies the necessary action or inaction in detail and clearly, and its essence is a management decision. Rules are usually the simplest form of planning. Rules are different from procedures. First, rules guide actions, but do not explain the time sequence; Second, a program can be regarded as a series of rules, but a rule may or may not be a part of the program. For example, "no smoking" is a rule, but it has nothing to do with the procedure; And a program that stipulates customer service can be expressed as some rules, such as giving a reply within 30 minutes after receiving the information that the customer needs service. Rules are not equal to policies. The purpose of policy is to guide actions and leave discretion for implementers; Although the rules also have a guiding role, when applying the rules, the executors have no right to handle them by themselves. It must be pointed out that, by their nature, rules and procedures are designed to restrict ideas; Therefore, rules and procedures are only used when members of an organization do not need to exercise their discretion. 7) Procedure (or planning) is a comprehensive plan, which includes objectives, policies, procedures, rules, assignment of tasks, steps to be taken, resources to be used and other factors needed to complete the established course of action. A plan can be big or small. Usually, a major plan (planning) may require many supporting plans. These support plans must be worked out and put into practice before major plans are implemented. All these plans must be coordinated and timed. 8) Budget is a report that expresses expected results in figures. A budget usually serves a plan, and it may be a plan itself. Nature of the plan

The fundamental purpose of the plan is to ensure the realization of management objectives. To engage in planning work and make it work effectively, we must grasp the essence of planning. Mainly in the following four aspects: 1. The universality of planning corresponds to the concept of planning, and the universality of planning also has two meanings: First, it means that all departments, links, units and posts in society must have corresponding plans in order to effectively achieve management objectives. Up to the country, down to a team, and even individuals. Second, all managers, from top management to first-line grass-roots management, must be engaged in planning work. Planning is the basic function of any manager. Maybe their planning work has different scope and characteristics. However, all managers should do planning work, and they must do their own planning work within the scope permitted by the policies stipulated by their superiors. If the manager doesn't plan the task, it is doubtful whether he is a manager. In the research of management science, it is found that the most important factor of grass-roots managers' sense of responsibility is their ability to engage in planning work. 2. The primacy of planning puts planning at the top of management functions, not only because from the perspective of management process, planning precedes other management functions, but also because in some occasions, planning is the only management function put into practice. The result of the plan may lead to a decision that there is no need for subsequent organization, leadership, coordination and control. For example, in a planning study on whether to build a new factory, if the conclusion is that the new factory is not economical, there will be no problem of preparing, organizing, leading and controlling the new factory. The reason why planning is the first is that it affects and runs through various management functions such as organization, leadership, coordination and control. 3, the scientific nature of the plan No matter what plan is made, it must follow the objective requirements, conform to the law of the development of things themselves, and cannot be divorced from reality and arbitrarily fabricated and imagined. Engaged in planning work is to make those things that could not have happened possible and those things that could have happened become reality through careful planning and subjective initiative of managers. Therefore, to engage in planning work, first, we must have a scientific attitude of seeking truth from facts, proceed from reality and do what we can; Second, there must be a reliable scientific basis, including accurate information and complete data; Third, there must be correct scientific methods, such as scientific prediction, system analysis, comprehensive balance, scheme optimization and so on. Only in this way can the overall planning be based on science, which is both creative and feasible. 4. The effectiveness of the plan should not only ensure the realization of organizational goals, but also choose the best plan from many plans to make rational use of resources and improve efficiency. So the plan should pursue efficiency. The efficiency of planning can be measured by the contribution of planning to organizational goals. Contribution refers to the realization of organizational goals and benefits, after deducting the expenses and other factors needed to formulate and implement this plan, the surplus can be obtained. When the goal to be completed in the plan is determined, the efficiency can also be measured by the cost of making and implementing the plan and other related costs (such as the loss caused by the implementation of the plan, the risk of the implementation of the plan, etc.). A plan is effective if it can get the maximum surplus or achieve the goal at a reasonable cost. It is particularly important to note that when measuring costs, we should not only use time, money or output to measure, but also measure the satisfaction of individuals and groups. The role of planning

In management practice, planning is the premise and foundation of other management functions, and it also permeates other management functions. Lenin pointed out: "Any plan is a scale, a criterion, a lighthouse and a road sign." It is the central link in the management process, so planning plays a particularly important role in management activities. 1. Planning is the program for the survival and development of an organization. We are in an era of economic, political, technological and social change and development. In this era, change and development have brought opportunities and risks to people, especially in the competition of markets, resources and spheres of influence. If managers can grasp opportunities and make use of them, at the same time, minimize risks, that is, build a convenient and stable bridge on the road to the goal, then organizations can be invincible in the vertical and horizontal choice of opportunities and risks, survive and develop. If you don't plan well, or don't plan at all, the consequences are unimaginable. 2. Planning is the premise of organization and coordination. In modern society, organizations in all walks of life and their internal components have more and more detailed division of labor, more and more complicated processes and closer coordination. In order to organize these complex organisms scientifically and make the activities of all links and departments connect with each other in time, space and quantity, not only around the overall goal, but also in their own ways and coordinate with each other, a strict plan is needed. If there is no plan of organization, coordination and control in management, it is as unimaginable as an automobile assembly plant without process design in advance. 3. Planning is the standard to guide implementation. The essence of planning is to set goals and specify ways and means to achieve them. Therefore, how to advance step by step towards the established goals and finally achieve the organizational goals, planning is undoubtedly the criterion for everyone's behavior in management activities. It guides people in different places, at different times and in different positions to achieve their respective sub-goals in an orderly manner around a general goal. If there is no plan to guide the behavior, the managed will inevitably show aimless blindness, while the manager will show changeable, arbitrary and contradictory decisions. The result must be chaotic organization, getting twice the result with half the effort, wasting people and money. In modern society, it can be said that almost every cause, every organization and even everyone's activities can't be without a blueprint. 4. Planning is the basis of control activities. Planning is not only the premise and criterion of organization, command and coordination, but also closely related to management and control activities. The plan determines the data, scale and standards of various complex management activities, which not only points out the direction for control, but also provides a basis for control activities. Experience tells us that it doesn't matter if unplanned activities can't be controlled. Because control itself is to correct the deviation from the plan and make the management activities consistent with the requirements of the target. If there is no plan as a parameter, managers will have no "compass", no "ruler" and no deviation in management activities. How do we control activities? As can be seen from the above, planning is the primary function of management functions, not just a matter of order, but the relationship and position of management functions in actual management activities, which cannot be vague. Preparation method of plan

In practice, effective planning methods mainly include target management, rolling planning and network planning technology. 1, management by objectives (MB for short) Management by objectives is a management system based on Taylor's scientific management and behavioral science management theory. Its concept was first put forward by peter drucker, a management expert, in his masterpiece Management Practice 1954, and then he put forward the idea of "management by objectives and self-control". Drucker believes that you don't have a goal when you have a job. On the contrary, you can use the goal to decide everyone's job. Therefore, "the mission and task of enterprises must be transformed into goals". If there is no goal in a field, the work in this field will inevitably be ignored. Therefore, managers should manage their subordinates through goals. When determining the organizational goals, the top managers of the organization must effectively decompose them into sub-goals of various departments and individuals. Managers should assess, evaluate, reward and punish their subordinates according to the completion of sub-goals. 2. Rolling Planning The rolling planning method is a planning method that works out the plan in a certain period according to the principle of "near details and far details", and then adjusts and revises the future plan according to the implementation of the plan and changes in the environment, and moves back step by step, combining short-term plan with medium-term plan. According to the implementation of the plan and the change of the environment, this method regularly modifies the future plan and advances it step by step, so that the short-term plan and the medium-term plan can be organically combined. Because it is difficult to accurately predict the future economic, political, cultural, technological, industrial, customer and other factors that will affect the survival and development of the organization, and with the extension of the planning cycle, this uncertainty is getting bigger and bigger. Therefore, if the plan made several years ago is executed mechanically, or the strategic plan is executed mechanically and statically, it may lead to huge mistakes and losses. Rolling planning method can avoid the adverse consequences caused by this uncertainty. The specific method is to make a plan in the form of near details and far details. 3. Network planning technology Network planning technology came into being and developed in the United States in the late 1950s. This method includes various network-based judgment methods, such as critical path method, program evaluation and review technique method, combined network method and so on. Network planning technology is a scientific planning management method with the development of modern science and technology and industrial production. In 1950s, in order to meet the needs of scientific research and new production organization and management, some new planning management methods appeared abroad. From 65438 to 0956, DuPont Company of the United States researched and established the critical path method (CPM for short) of network planning technology, which was tried in a chemical project and achieved good economic results. During the period of 1958, when the weapons department of the US Navy was developing the Polaris missile program, the program review method (PERT for short) was applied to plan, evaluate, review and control the project, which achieved great success. In the early 1960s, network planning technology was popularized in the United States, and this new planning management method was applied to all new projects and introduced to Japan and other western European countries. With the rapid development of modern science and technology and the continuous improvement of management level, network planning technology is also constantly developing and improving. At present, it has been widely used in the fields of industry, national defense, construction, transportation and scientific research all over the world, and has become a popular scientific method of modern production management in developed countries. Planning program

Any planning work must follow certain procedures or steps. Although the small plan is relatively simple and the big plan is more complicated, the working steps of managers in making plans are similar, including the following contents in turn: 1. Identifying opportunities precedes actual planning. Strictly speaking, it is not a part of the plan, but it is the real starting point of the planning work. Because it predicts the possible changes in the future, clearly and completely recognizes the opportunities for organizational development, clarifies the strengths, weaknesses and status of the organization, recognizes the ability of the organization to use opportunities, and recognizes the possible impact of uncertain factors on the organization. Knowing the opportunity is very important for making a good plan. A business expert once said: "Knowing opportunities is the key to overcoming risks and seeking survival and development." Zhuge Liang's story of "borrowing an arrow from a straw boat" is immortal. Its genius lies in that he saw that there would be fog on the river in three days, and Cao Jun had the opportunity to be unfamiliar with water and didn't dare to fight, which miraculously achieved his strategic goal. There are many such examples in enterprise management. 2. The second step in setting goals and making plans is to set goals for the whole organization and its subordinate units on the basis of understanding opportunities. Goal refers to the expected result, which points out the direction for the whole organization, departments and members, describes the future situation of the organization, and can be used as a standard to measure actual performance. The main task of the plan is to decompose the organizational goals into various departments and activities, and form the organizational goal structure, including the time structure and spatial structure of the goals. 3, determine the preconditions The preconditions of the so-called planned work are the assumptions of the planned work, in short, the expected environment when the plan is implemented. The more detailed and thorough the person in charge of planning is about the planning premise, and the more coordinated the planning work will be. According to the internal and external environment of the organization, the preconditions for planning work can be divided into external preconditions and internal preconditions; According to the degree of controllability, the preconditions of planning work can be divided into three types: uncontrollable, partially controllable and controllable. Most external premises are uncontrollable and partially controllable, while most internal premises are controllable. The more uncontrollable preconditions, the greater the uncertainty, and the more it is necessary to determine the probability of occurrence and the degree of influence through prediction. 4. The fourth step in drawing up alternative feasible plans is to find, draw up and select feasible action plans. "All roads lead to Rome" describes that there are many ways to achieve a certain goal. Usually, the most conspicuous scheme is not necessarily the best scheme, and a little modification and deduction of the past scheme will not get the best scheme. An unremarkable scheme or a scheme that everyone can't think of at ordinary times is often the best, which reflects the importance of scheme innovation. In addition, the more schemes, the better. It is rare to make a plan without a reasonable alternative. It is more common not to find more alternatives, but to reduce the number of alternatives in order to analyze the most promising alternatives. Even with mathematical methods and computers, we still have to limit the number of options in order to concentrate on analyzing a few of the most promising options. 5. Evaluation of alternatives After finding out various alternatives and checking their advantages and disadvantages, the next step is to weigh their advantages and disadvantages according to the preconditions and objectives and evaluate the alternatives. Evaluation is essentially a kind of value judgment, on the one hand, it depends on the evaluation criteria adopted by the evaluator; On the other hand, it depends on the weight given to each standard by the evaluator. A scheme seems to be the most profitable, but it needs to invest a lot of cash and the recovery of funds is slow; Another scheme may seem less profitable, but less risky; The third scheme has little immediate effect, but it may be more suitable for the company's long-term goals. We should use the mature matrix evaluation method, analytic hierarchy process and multi-objective evaluation method in operational research to evaluate and compare. If the only goal in a business is to maximize the current profit, if the future is not uncertain, if there is no need to worry about the availability of cash and capital, and if most factors can be decomposed into certain data, then the evaluation under such conditions will be relatively easy. However, because planners usually face many uncertainties, lack of funds and various intangible factors, the evaluation work is usually difficult, even for relatively simple problems. A company wants to produce a new product mainly for credibility; The forecast results show that this may cause financial losses, but whether the gain of reputation can offset this loss is still an unsolved problem. Because in most cases, there are many alternatives and many variables and constraints to consider, the evaluation will be extremely difficult. When evaluating alternative schemes, we should pay attention to the following points: first, carefully examine the constraints and hidden dangers of each scheme; Second, we should use the overall benefit view to measure the plan; Third, we should consider both tangible factors that can be expressed by quantity and intangible factors that cannot be expressed by quantity; Fourthly, to dynamically examine the effect of the plan, we should consider both the benefits and the losses brought by the implementation of the plan, with special attention to those potential and indirect losses. 6. Scheme selection planning Step 6: Scheme selection. This is a key step based on the first five steps, and it is also the substantive stage of decision-making-the selection stage. This may happen, and sometimes it is found that there are more than two desirable schemes at the same time. In this case, we must determine which scheme to adopt first, and refine and improve other schemes as backup schemes. 7. The basic plan of derivative plan also needs the support of derivative plan. For example, at the beginning of the year, a company made a sales plan of "the sales in that year increased by 15% compared with the previous year", and there are many plans connected with this plan, such as production plan and promotion plan. For another example, when a company decides to develop a new business, this decision needs a lot of derivative plans to support it, such as hiring and training various personnel, raising funds, advertising plans and so on. 8. Budget After the decision is made and the plan is determined, the last step in the planning work is to turn the plan into a budget and digitize the plan. Budgeting, on the one hand, is to make the index system of the plan clearer, on the other hand, it is also convenient for enterprises to control the implementation of the plan. Qualitative planning is often difficult in comparability, controllability and rewards and punishments, while quantitative planning has hard constraints.