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An approach to Planning


What is in this guide

  1. Why should you use this approach?
  2. How to ensure the right amount of involvement in the planning process.
  3. How to plan systematically.
  4. How to plan strategically.
  5. How to use the planning cycle for ongoing learning and improvement.

This section is part of the planning guide which is broken into four sections. Section 1 is an introduction to planning. This section deals with an approach to planning called Logical Framework Approach. Section 3 provides guidelines on how to use each of the planning steps. A guide to facilitators of planning workshops is provided in Section 4.

  1. Why should you use this approach?

The approach used in this guide is based on the Logical Framework Approach (LFA). This approach has been chosen because:

The approach can seem complex if you are not used to it. This section is should help you understand and use it effectively. Do not let the approach intimidate you. If it does not help you, do not use it. However, you should try to ensure that the approach you use is in line with the six key things that help ensure planning is effective, as outlined in Section 1: An Introduction to Planning, Part 3. The following section will give you ideas on how to do this. The Logical Framework Approach (LFA) is also used in the guidelines on how to complete each of the basic planning steps that is provided in the next section (Section 3: How to Plan). We have given an example of an organisation, Molayezo, using the LFA to help you see how it could be used. The link to this example is at the end of this section. Most of the examples in the later Section 3 are built on this example.

  1. How to ensure the right amount of involvement in the planning process

You need to work out the following things to decide who should be involved in the planning process and how much they need to be involved:

  1. Why is participation important?

Most people agree that participation in planning processes is very important. The involvement of staff and of your target community is particularly important for organisations involved in development work or providing a service. But other individuals, groups or organisations may also need to be involved in some way. Some of the potential benefits of involvement are:

  1. Who should be involved, why and how?

It is clear that participation has many potential benefits. But, it can be difficult and can take time to achieve. If we are not clear about why we are doing it, we may abandon it once differences of opinion or challenges to our established way of thinking make us uncomfortable. Participation can take extra time and resources and so we should carefully assess its benefits in any situation. Many people have noted that participation for participation’s sake can limit progress or even stop progress altogether.

You do not need to involve all stakeholders in the same way. It is important to discuss who should be involved and in what way. Participation and involvement can mean many different things. The following are a range of different possible kinds of involvement:

We need to work out carefully what participation is needed, by whom and why and then make a firm commitment to this. The following are some different ideas on participation and suggestions that can help you find a good balance between "getting on with it" and a process that includes more people:

People need to be part of the thinking not just the doing. This is particularly true if people will need to change, if the problems are complex, or if the success and sustainability of the project depend on the ongoing commitment of others. Participation can mean that once work starts, progress may be faster and people may be more committed and able to find solutions when problems come up. It leaves the target community more in control of their own lives and development.

  • people rather than technology
  • community motivation rather than (consuming) service
  • a bottom-up rather than a top-down approach to planning" (Boyd, D and William, D)

Involvement in the process of planning helps build shared understanding and can help communities to feel more capable of improving their own lives or; feel more like active agents of change towards a goal they themselves have chosen. Involvement in these decisions can be the beginning of change. It can make people feel they have the power to change their circumstances. This is the basis of development, which often requires people to change and take a more active role in their own lives and communities if it is to be sustainable.

Careful involvement of staff and your primary target group in collecting information about a situation and analysing what it means creates the basis for commitment to action. It builds a deeper agreement about what needs to change and why it needs to change. It also creates the basis for ongoing learning about how to make the change happen. This learning will help everyone take responsibility for tackling the problems that will come up.

For this reason, it is not enough to just ask people what they want, but to involve them in a systematic process of analysing their needs and identifying realistic options to addressing problems and issues. It is also important that the planning process clarifies the roles various people and groups will need to play in carrying out decisions. Planning should encourage people to think realistically about what is possible. A good planning process helps staff and other stakeholders take responsibility for making realistic decisions and for carrying out the decisions made.

It is not only staff and your primary target community whose involvement you need to consider. Development work or providing a service usually depends on a fairly wide range of other people, groups and organisations for its success. These are called stakeholders. Stakeholders may be:

Any and all of these individuals, groups or organisations may affect your work in important ways. You may need their active support or you may simply need their broad support. They may be potential allies and partners or they may be potential opponents of change. In order to work out whether and how to involve them you will need to conduct a stakeholder analysis. A stakeholder analysis involves deciding:

  1. Who all your stakeholders are;
  2. What kind of stake they have in your work;
  3. Which stakeholders are important for your work or have a big influence;
  4. Who are primary stakeholders and who are not;
  5. How you can gain the support of potential allies and partners;
  6. How you can reduce the influence of potential opponents;
  7. Whose needs, interests and concerns should be given priority; and
  8. Who should be involved in the planning process and how – what level of involvement and in which step(s) in the process.

See Section 3, Step 1, How to prepare to plan, where you can get more information, advice and examples on how to analyse stakeholders as part of your preparations.

  1. How to plan systematically

There are many different approaches to planning systematically. They each recommend slightly different approaches and often use different words (for example, "aim" and "goal" for the same thing, "immediate objective" and "purpose" for the same thing). The systematic approach to planning we are suggesting in this guide is based on an approach called the Logical Framework Approach (LFA). It is widely used by donors and others. Donors often expect those applying for funds to use it to support their request. It can seem complex but is actually not that complex. In this approach, systematic planning involves reaching agreements in four areas:

  1. What you must achieve and how. There are four kinds or "levels" of objectives that must be agreed on: Your overall long-term goal; your purpose; the specific objectives you must achieve; and the activities you will do to achieve each objective. These terms are explained below.
  2. What important conditions will need to exist for you to be successful.
  3. What criteria or indicators you will use to evaluate your work.
  4. Agreeing where, how and from whom you will get the information you will need to evaluate your work.

The following explains what each of these areas means in more detail.

  1. Agree on what you must achieve and how – 4 levels of objectives

The LFA uses four levels of objectives to help you clarify what you want to achieve and decide what action you will take. Each level is linked to the next, so that you can systematically work out what must be achieved to achieve your overall purpose and make a significant contribution to the effective development of your target community (your goal):

Systematic planning involves knowing where you are at present and working out what must be done to change this to the situation you would like to see exist (your goal). Planning involves working backwards from the goal and deciding how you will contribute to achieving it. This makes sure all your plans and activities are relevant to this goal. The four levels of objectives are:

To decide these four levels of objectives you should:

  1. Agree, for each level of objectives, what important conditions will need to exist that are outside your control – your assumptions

These are conditions that will need to exist for you to succeed but are outside the control of your organisation, programme or project. In the LFA these are called assumptions. They are the conditions you assume will exist as you plan. Important conditions are those that may cause you to fail to achieve your objectives if they do not exist. Examples of such conditions could be that you assume you will get support from government or other NGOs or donors. Your planning should include how to reduce the risk if these conditions do not exist. This might, for example, include efforts to ensure the support of an influential stakeholder, like a local councillor, a government department or a donor. Identifying these assumptions in your planning is useful because it also allows you to check whether these conditions do actually exist as you implement your plans. This gives you an early warning system for potential problems. You may need to revise your plans if these conditions do not exist as you assumed they would.

  1. Agree, for each level of objectives, what criteria or indicators you will use to measure and evaluate

These are agreed criteria or indicators you will use to evaluate whether the objective has been effectively achieved and has had the results you expected. You will need to do this for each of the four levels of objectives. The criteria or indicators at the activity level are the resources you will need.

Criteria are the things we use to make judgements. For example, we might judge the effectiveness of a plan to start a crèche by seeing whether the parents support the plan and are committed to supporting the crèche. These are our criteria for judging the effectiveness of the plan.

Indicators are used when criteria are too general and we need more concrete signs to indicate whether we have achieved the criteria or not. Indicators are agreed signs of successful achievement that will make it easier to assess later whether we have in fact successful achieved what we intended. In the example above, "support" and "commitment" are general ideas and we would all understand them in different ways. Indicators could then be used to clarify what you will use to judge your success. For example, you might use the number of parents who support the plan or take an active part in fundraising as indicators of "support" and "commitment" in the following way: The indicator of "support" for the plan could be that "20 out of the 32 parents who attended the first meeting attend all further meetings agreed on". The indicator of "commitment’ might be that "each parent gives more than 4 hours each month to joint fundraising activities". Clear, concrete criteria and indicators are the basis for effective evaluation. They explain what successful achievement means concretely for you.

Criteria or indicators should record your agreements on what successful achievement will mean. To do this they will usually need to include "how many" (quantity), "how well" (quality) and "by when" (deadline). It is often easier to find and agree indicators of quantity ("20 out of 32 parents") and deadline ("within two months"). It is often harder to find and agree indicators of quality, signs that we have not just done something (how many and by when), but done it well. But, these are very important indicators. They will guide us in deciding on the best ways of achieving the objective successfully. They will also lay the basis for agreement on whether we achieved it effectively. For example, if we say we ran 20 workshops by June, this tells us nothing about whether people learned relevant and useful things. It is worth giving the time and energy necessary at the planning stage to discuss what "doing something well" actually means and finding indicators for evaluating this. In this example, we might use the indicator that "participants agree the workshop achieved all the learning objectives set at the start of the programme effectively." Or, you could use the indicator that "the organisations from which participants came agree that, after the workshop, participants were able to do the things the workshop had intended to teach."

More information on developing effective criteria and indicators is given in How to plan for evaluation in the more detailed guidelines on How to use the basic planning steps.

  1. Agree, for each of the criteria or indicators, where and how and from whom you will get the information

In this area of the planning, you will decide where, how and from whom you will get the information needed to assess achievement. For example you might agree that you will get it from interviews with specific people, from reports or from the minutes of meetings. This is important because you will often need to include plans to collect this information in your activities. In the example above, the source of information for the indicator "20 out of the 32 parents who attended the first meeting attend all further meetings agreed on" could be the minutes of meetings with parents or attendance register.

Summary of the logical framework

This systematic process is the basis of the Logical Framework Approach to planning. It involves four levels of objectives:

and four areas of planning

Here is an example of a table you can use to summarise all your planning decisions. The four levels of objectives have been listed down the left hand side and the four areas of planning have been listed across the top.

Note: The numbers indicate the order in which you can deal with each area (although in practice you may need to move back and forwards sometimes as your planning shows you things you did not think of earlier).

Objectives

Criteria or indicators

Source of information

Important assumptions

(1) Goal :

(The changed situation in society you aim to contribute to achieving)

(8)

(11)

(5)

(2) Purpose

(The result the organisation, programme or project is expected to achieve)

(9)

(12)

(6)

(3) Specific Objectives

(The specific results that must be achieved to achieve the purpose)

(10)

(13)

(7)

(4) Activities

(The actions that must be taken to achieve each objective)

(14) Resources

(The resources that will be needed to achieve the activities - including people, finance, information, specific skills and equipment etc)

Once you have completed your planning, you can use the plan to check whether your logic makes sense to you by working up from the bottom of the logical framework. If you complete all the activities, will you achieve each specific objective? If you achieve all your specific objectives, will you have achieved your purpose? If you achieve your purpose will you have made a significant contribution to the achievement of the goal?

This framework is useful as a guide to help you plan systematically and as a way of summarising your thinking. But, if it does not make sense to you, do not use it. The key is to develop an agreed plan that will guide activity effectively towards a valuable goal and enable you to evaluate and learn from your achievements. Do not end up worrying more about filling in the squares than getting an effective and relevant plan in place. The basic planning steps at the end of this section are intended to help you develop these effectively.

An example of how the organisation we have called Molayezo used this approach is accessible at the end of this section. It includes an example of what a summary based on the Logical Framework Approach would look like.

  1. How to plan strategically

Planning strategically is about using a systematic approach to make the most effective choices about what your organisation’s objectives should be and the approach you will use to achieve them. Planning strategically is also about making sure that everything done in your organisation is strategic and makes the most valuable contribution to the organisation’s overall goal and purpose. This means you will need to develop a clear overall organisational strategy before you develop programme plans or project plans. The organisation’s overall strategy must be the basis for all other planning in the organisation. This will ensure that everything done by your organisation makes the most strategic contribution to positive change in society (your goal) that it can.

  1. What is strategy?

Strategy is the choices you make about your objectives (all four levels) and the choices you make about the approach you will use to achieve your objectives. If your planning is strategic, it means you have given careful thought to how best to achieve what you want. All planning should be strategic. Planning that is strategic involves:

Strategy is not just a plan on paper; it is what you actually do and how you use your resources to do it. When we assess our strategy, we don’t assess what we said we would do but what we actually did. Often the strategy we plan and the strategy we actually use in organisations are different. The reasons for this in non-profit organisations are usually those listed above in the section listing "specific challenges" we face in planning. The planning we have done was not effective and the plans were not revised when necessary. For these reasons, effective strategy development should ensure that everyone in the organisation and often some key stakeholders are involved in systematically making the choices about your approach.

Planning strategically involves choosing the best approach through:

  • The current situation to understand what is causing the problem or issue and the effects it is having;
  • The needs of the target community you intend to benefit so that you choose a goal and purpose that is relevant to these needs;
  • The interests and concerns of all key stakeholders who can affect what is achieved so that you can understand who might support and who might hinder you in your work;
  • Your own organisation and what it is capable of so that you can make the best use of its strengths and plan to address its weaknesses.
  1. Strategic Planning – linking organisation strategy to programme and project planning

There are three basic kinds of planning used in organisations:

Programme and project plans must be based on the organisation’s strategy. The following explains what these different kinds of plans are. It also explains how these different kinds of plans could be linked, using the Logical Framework Approach, in order to ensure that all planning and everything an organisation does is strategic.

Organisation strategy

Organisation strategy is the overall strategy of the organisation. It is the choices you have made about the contribution your organisation intends to make to building a better society (goal or vision), what your organisation exists to achieve (purpose or vision) and the approach you will take to achieving it (specific strategic objectives). This provides the framework for everything else in the organisation. All other planning of programmes or projects should be based on this overall strategic framework.

The following diagram shows how the four levels of objectives form the basis for an organisational strategy.

1. Goal :

(The changed situation in society your organisation aims to contribute to achieving)

2. Purpose

(The result the organisation is expected to achieve)

3. Specific Objectives

(The specific results that must be achieved to achieve the purpose)

4.Activities

(The actions that must be taken - what must be done, by whom and by when)

Programme planning

Programmes are identified using the organisation’s overall strategy. A programme is the longer-term action that will be taken to achieve each of the specific strategic objectives agreed on in the overall organisation strategy. Programme planning is about turning organisational strategy into coherent and co-ordinated longer-term implementation plans using the strategic objectives agreed on. The organisation’s work is done through different programmes. Programmes may be sets of service-related activities or groups of projects that are intended to achieve strategic objectives in ways that are relevant to the organisation’s strategic purpose (mission) and goal (vision) and target community.

Programmes have their own goals and purpose but these must be based on those of the organisation and are often based directly on a specific strategic objective identified in the organisation strategy. Programmes should also be planned using a strategic approach based on analysis (of the situation, needs, stakeholders and organisation’s capabilities) and choice of the best strategy for achieving the purpose and goal. The basic planning steps suggested at the end of this section will be as useful with programme planning as with developing the overall strategy. Examples of programme areas for an NGO opposing violence against women could be running a helpline; lobbying for policy change in a particular area; mobilising and organising women against abuse; and conducting ongoing research into the impact of different efforts to stop violence against women.

The following diagram shows how organisational strategy and programme planning can be linked using the four levels of objectives of the logical framework:

Organisational strategy

 

Goal :

This is often called the Vision (The changed situation in society your organisation aims to contribute to achieving)

Programme planning level

Purpose

This is often called the Mission and states what the organisation aims to achieve, how and who its target community is. (The result the organisation intends to achieve)

The organisation’s purpose becomes the goal for each programme

(The changed situation in society each programme aims to contribute to achieving)

Specific Objectives

(The specific results that must be achieved to achieve the organisation’s purpose)

Each objective becomes the purpose of a particular programme

(The result the programme is expected to achieve)

Activities

(Who will take responsibility for developing each objective into a programme plan and by when.)

Specific Objectives

(The specific results that must be achieved to achieve the programme purpose)

 

Activities

(The actions that must be taken to achieve each objective)

Project planning

Projects are more defined and limited. They are usually identified through planning for a particular programme and are designed to achieve one of the specific programme objectives. Projects are usually shorter-term and more concrete than programmes. They are often intended to achieve a specific result by a specific time and/or within a specific budget. Examples of project areas could be establishing a new counselling centre within a year, bringing out a publication within three months or conducting a campaign for the improvement of laws prohibiting pollution to coincide with Human Rights Day.

Projects may involve people with different kinds of skills and knowledge to work out the best way of achieving the objective and contribute to its achievement. Projects have their own goal and purpose but these should be relevant to the organisation’s (and the programme’s, if they are part of a programme) goal and purpose. Projects should also be planned using a strategic approach based on analysis (of the situation, needs, stakeholders and organisation’s capabilities) and choice of the best strategy for achieving the purpose and goal. The basic planning steps suggested at the end of this section will be as useful with project planning as with programme planning or developing the overall strategy.

The following diagram shows how project planning can be linked to organisational strategy and programme planning using the four levels of objectives of the logical framework:

Organisational strategy

   

Goal :

This is often called the Vision (The changed situation in society your organisation aims to contribute to achieving)

Programme planning level  

Purpose

This is often called the Mission and states what the organisation aims to achieve, how and who its target community is. (The result the organisation is expected to achieve)

The organisation’s purpose becomes the goal for each programme

(The changed situation in society each programme aims to contribute to achieving)

Project planning level

Specific Objectives

(The specific results that must be achieved to achieve the purpose)

Each objective becomes the purpose of a particular programme

(The result the programme is expected to achieve)

The programme’s purpose becomes the goal for each project

(The changed situation in society each project aims to contribute to achieving)

 

Specific Objectives

(The specific results that must be achieved to achieve the programme purpose)

Each objective becomes the purpose of a particular project.

(The result the project is expected to achieve)

 

Activities

(The actions that must be taken to achieve each objective)

Specific Objectives

(The specific results that must be achieved to achieve the project purpose)

   

Activities

(The actions that must be taken to achieve each objective)

Click here for an example showing how Molayezo used the Logical Framework Approach to link organisation strategy, programme planning and project planning. (see Click 1 – example of nesting LFA)

  1. How to plan for evaluation

The systematic Logical Framework Approach outlined above includes planning for evaluation. It lays a systematic basis for transparency and accountability through providing a clear record of agreements. It allows for the inclusion of all those with a stake in the success of your work. It also lays a good basis for agreement about what was achieved effectively, what was not and why it was or was not achieved effectively:

The Logical Framework Approach to planning includes all these ways of ensuring evaluation possible and useful. More information on planning to evaluate is given in Step 6 of the basic planning steps.

click here for an example of how criteria and indicators could be used. The example shows how Molayezo used the Logical Framework Approach to agree criteria and indicators for evaluating their organisation strategy. (see Click 1 – example of nesting LFA)

  1. How to use the planning cycle for ongoing learning and improvement

Planning and evaluation are key parts of the basic cycle of learning and development for individuals, groups or organisations. We plan, take action and then we reflect on the action taken. We look at what happened as a result. This enables us to evaluate, to make more general judgements about what works well and what does not. We then plan on the basis of this learning and move back into the cycle to improve on our achievements. This is particularly important if we do not have a clear, 100% reliable road map for how we get to where we want to be. The planning cycle assists us to learn and continually improve our understanding of how to make better progress. Planning should always start with evaluation. Planning, as the diagram shows, should not be treated as an event you do once a year. It is part of an ongoing process of assessing our achievements that should happen every few months. You may have a longer-term plan covering a year or two, but you should change you plans if your evaluation shows you need to.

The Logical Framework Approach and the Basic Planning steps outlined in Section 3 help to make sure that you learn effectively by:

Section 3 uses the Logical Framework Approach as a basis for the guidelines on how to plan using the basic planning steps.

If you want an example of how this approach could be used before you read the more detailed guidelines on how to use the basic planning steps,

Click here for an example showing how Molayezo used the Logical Framework Approach to link organisation strategy, programme planning and project planning.


Introduction to planning      |     An approach to planning      |     Case Study:Example of planning      
How to plan - eight planning steps      |     Facilitating A planning workshop

Planning Index



Index

Meeting skills   |   Inputs and verbal reports   |   Executive portfolios   |   Conflict management
Planning   |   Understanding your constituency   |   Recruiting membersGuide to Constitutions
Guide to the Nonprofit Organisations Act  |  Legal structures commonly used   
Education & Training guide


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