Planning is the first and foremost activity to achieve desired results in the administrative process. It involves determining goals and committing the resources in advance. Millet defines planning as the process of determining objectives of administrative efforts and of devising the means calculated to achieve the objects.
It is a conscious activity of rationalising the decision-making processes in an organisation. According to Herbert Simon, planning is the activity that concerns itself with proposals for the future; evaluation of alternative proposals; and the methods by which these proposals may be achieved.
Dimock describes planning as an organised attempt to anticipate and make rational arrangements for dealing with future problems by projecting trends, thus, planning is indispensable to administrative process as decisions to realise the goals limit the range of choices available to the administration due to limited resources.
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Despite its importance, administrative planning is rarely discussed and followed entirely in administration. To be more specific, we are more familiar with economic planning or financial planning, but we know very little about the nature and methods of administrative planning. Yet, the administrator who has earned some reputation in the profession does follow some sort of a planned approach to his job. However, it is understood more as a personal skill than a kind of transferable knowledge.
The tradition has been that the Government Departments function with little formal planning. There are various reasons for this, as John Garrett points out. “There has been a body of opinion in the higher civil service, though it is now diminishing, that systematic research and planning has little relevance to its work.
Concentration upon the awareness of ministerial responsibility tends to put a low valuation on systematic research-based planning and a high one on rapid reaction to the topic of the day.” Predominance of politics, job security, and profit motive are some of the reasons for lack of sustained planning effort in the government.
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However, nowadays the need for planning has been widely acknowledged, and various methods and techniques are being proposed to make planning a reality in the government.
The socio-economic and political environment of the government is never static, and the governments everywhere are struggling hard to cope with changes. In fact, resources are always scarce and they have to be allocated among competing alternatives to maximise production and achieve socioeconomic satisfaction.
Planning, involves a methodical mental exercise about achievement of results by means of advance preparation of activity-scheduling. Thus, it involves ‘simulation’ of activity-sequences. With more and more cost consciousness and increasing result-orientation in public administration, planning has assumed critical importance in the government.
In a developing country like India, rapid socio-economic development depends on public programmes and projects. In this context, administrative planning has a crucial role to play in development. It is universally acknowledged that administrative planning is the key to planned socioeconomic development and achievement of intended results.
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Every five-year plan sets down targets for each sector like agriculture, irrigation etc. In this condition, administrative planning becomes a pertinent input in target fulfilment and decision-making.