Accounting technicians scheme west africa

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A.10 Tools/Factors Aiding Effective Planning

i.
Availability of Planning Information: Where reliable statistical/planning data are available, planning reflects current issues and extrapolation of future events. Such information include price index, population trend, market share, etc. iii bStable Planning Environment: Enhances effective planning (e.g economic, political, legal, social-cultural, and technological factors. For greater effectiveness, a reasonable degree of predictability is necessary. iii.
Availability of Managers with Planning Skills Most managers do not possess these skills. An effective plan is a function of the planning skills of the manager associated with the plan. iv.
Knowledge of the Organization and its Business The nature of the business must be clearly understood by managers, if not, costly mistakes maybe made when putting up a plan. vi bEmployees participation Where they participate, they show greater commitment to the success of the plan and implement it better. vii bFlexibility:bi Plan must be flexible enough to accommodate future changes in the key assumptions with minimal disruption in the organization. viii bTimely Control/Review: Regular review of performance is necessary to ensure effectiveness of planning. This helps in identifying deviations from set goals and timely correction.

A.11 Barriers to Effective Planning

Although the importance and benefits of planning cannot be overemphasized, many organizations still do not achieve the desired results because of pitfalls in planning owing to the following reasons i) Goals. Goals can constitute a barrier to planning in two ways. First, the goal maybe inappropriate, unclear or unattainable. When goals are not relevant to the pressing problems or challenges of the organization, they are unlikely to motivate managers to plan effectively to achieve them. Similarly, when a goal is perceived to be unattainable, it will not aid the planning process. The second way is when managers are reluctant to establish goals for their organization due to fear of failure or other reasons. In such circumstances, effective planning would not be achieved. ii) Reward system. When rewards are carefully linked to a specified behaviour, reinforcement theory suggests that employees would engage in that behaviour. Individuals would engage in behaviours that are rewarded and fail to engage in those that are not rewarded. Hence a major barrier to planning is when management fails to reward desired planning activities. iii) Dynamic and complex environment. Planning depends critically on ability to forecast and assess the future state of the environment. When the environment is highly dynamic and complex forecasting is extremely difficult. This constitutes a barrier to effective planning.

120 iv) Lack of time and resources. Planning takes substantial time and resources. Inadequacy of time and other resources may constitute a barrier to planning. v) Too much time and effort of top management being spent on current problems, learning little or no time for long-range planning, vi) Failure to develop meaningful and realistic goals and objectives. vii) Lack of commitment to planning and the belief that top management can delegate the planning function to a planner. viii) Personnel inertia to changes brought about by planning activities. ix) Too much formality and lack of flexibility in the system which hinders creativity. x) Failure to involve major line managers in the planning process. xi) Inadequacy or lack of necessary resources for planning implementation. xii)
Overreliance of top management on reflective thinking and experience. xiii) Failure to create an organizational climate that is conducive and not resistant to planning

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