Planning is an important factor in any successful business or home. Planning involves deciding of future course of action, or in other words planning is deciding in advance what is to be done, how to be done, when to be done, and by whom to be done. It is an arrangement for doing something. Planning is a thinking process and is required for intelligent actions. It is the most basic of all management functions. A plan bridges the gap between where we are and where we want to go.
The Three Steps The first step is determining the organization’s mission and goals. A mission statement is necessary for every business. It tells a customer or whoever reading the goals and achievements the business hopes to fulfill in so many years from now. In the second step management uses SWOT analysis and the five forces model to analyze strategies that will allow an organization to accomplish its missions and achieve its goals. The SWOT Analysis is “a planning exercise to identify strengths and weaknesses inside an organization and opportunities and threats in the environment” (Bethel College, 2006, P.190). The SWOT includes corporate, business, and functional level strategy to do the job. Corporate Level manages the growth of business, Business Level finds ways to compete, and Functional Level improves values of a business. The Five Forces Model affects how much profit organizations competing within the same industry can expect to make. These are the parts of the model: The level of rivalry among organizations in an industry, potential for entry into an industry, power of large suppliers and customers, and the threat of substitute products. This model is also used with SWOT to analyze strengths and weaknesses. The third step is implementing strategy. When implementation is going on a manager is appointing different responsibilities to groups and individuals with