Policy and Planning

Policy 

Policy is a statement of aims, purposes, principles or intentions, which serve as continuing guidelines for management in accomplishing objectives. 

Philosophy 

Philosophy is the science that seeks to organize and systematize all fields of knowledge as a means of understanding and interpreting the totality of reality, usually regarded as comprising ethics, aesthetics, metaphysics and epistemology. 

Vision 

‘Vision is something which is apparently seen otherwise than by ordinary sight. The action or fact of seeing or contemplating something not actually present to the eye; mystical or supernatural in sight or foresight. Vision is to articulate the purposes of an organization into idioms and goals. 

Planning 

Planning is the formal process of making decisions for the future of individuals and organizations. Planning involves dealing on aims and objectives, selecting to correct strategies and program to achieve the aims, determining and allocating the resources required and ensuring that plans are communicated to all concerned. Plans are statement of things to be done and the sequence and timing in which they should be done in order to achieve a given end. 

TYPES OF PLANNING 

There are two basic kinds of planning: strategic and operational. Strategic planning, also known as long range, comprehensive, integrated, overall and managerial planning, has three dimensions: the identification and examination of future opportunities, threats and consequences; the process of analyzing an organization’s environment and developing compatible objectives along with the appropriate strategies with policies capable of achieving those objectives; and the integration of the various elements of planning into an overall structure of plans so that each unit of the organization knows in advance what must be done when and by whom. Operational planning, also known as divisional planning, is concerned with the implementation of the larger goals and strategies that have been determined by strategic planning; it is also concerned with improving current operations and with the allocation of resources through the operating budget. 

(a) Macro Planning: 

Macro Planning deals with broad entities having such large magnitude, aggregates, and averages as National Income, Per Capita Income, National Expenditure on consumption and income; Balance of Trade and Balance of Payment, National Population, Total Enrolment, Enrolment Ratios, Age Structure etc. Thus, macro-planning deals with broad plans not taking note of breakdowns between skills or scheme implementation at grass root level. 

(b) Micro-Planning: 

As against macro theory, micro economic theory analyses consumption and investment of households, prices of particular goods, output, sales and purchase decisions of individual firms and industries. Micro-Planning in education starts from grass root level. For instance, the head of an institution has to plan how best he/she should bring all the children to school in his/her area. Here planning at the village level has to be done. How best individual schools can bring and retain all the children in schools; how schools in individual habitations can be provided; and whether eligible students are getting their scholarships on time. 

(c) Decentralised Planning: 

Decentralization implies distribution of administrative powers and functions among local constituents. Decentralized planning means to confer the authority of planning for the local development. The 73rd and 74th constitutional amendments have placed the primary education under the control of Panchayati Raj institutions. Under the decentralized planning model, all local units prepare their plans after due consultations with their people and analysis of the strengths and weaknesses of the planning area. These local level plans are then coordinated and summated to make the district plan by taking into account the availability of the physical and financial resources. Apart from this, in India the Government have also delegated financial and administrative powers to the heads of educational institutions to which budget is also allocated for being spent by them according to their requirements. Such financial delegations are available in the general Financial Rules. The administrative powers are delegated according to the provisions contained in the state Education Code of each state. 

Many times decentralization is viewed as something opposite to centralization. In the socialist countries, the concept of centralized planning was practised as the central authority did all planning. These plans were then passed on to the grassroots for implementation. 

(d) Rolling Plan: 

A long-term plan that is revised regularly and each revision is projected forward again for the same period as the original plan. Thus, a three-year Rolling Plan might be revised each year so that at the end of year one the plan is revised and fresh projections made to the end of the year four. 

(e) Strategic Planning: 

The managerial process of developing and maintaining a viable link between the organization’s objectives and resources and its environmental opportunities. 

(f) Contingency Planning: 

A planning technique, which determines actions to be taken by individuals and groups at specific places and times if abnormal threats or opportunities arise. 

(g) Corporate Planning: 

A technique, which aims to integrate all the planning activities of a company and relate them to the best overall objectives for the company. 

(h) Manpower Planning: 

A generic term for those techniques used to arrive at a specification of any aspect of future manpower requirement, deployment or development needs. Manpower planning has been an important feature of centralized planning in socialist countries. The Government of India has established a specialized institute to undertake manpower planning exercises in the Indian context.

(i) Process Planning:

Determining how the product or part should be manufactured by referring to the component and assembly drawings and

(i) drafting an operation sequence for each component;

(ii) deciding the machines or hand tools to be used;

(iii) drawing up the manufacturing layout for each component and sub-assembly, the departments and type of albour to perform the operations and specifying the tools, fixtures and gauges to be used.

(j) Indicative Planning:

Indicative Planning is planning by agreement and indication of desirable targets rather than by compulsion or decree. It is also known as Participative Planning.