Limitations or Criticism of Planning Part II

This is in continuation to my earlier Blog Post on “Limitations/ Criticism of Planning”. Some of the remaining points are explained below:-

Delay in Implementation/ Action: Planning process involves numerous activities like gathering information, planning for resources, hiring professionals, finding alternatives, analyzing and evaluating alternatives, selecting the best alternative, etc. All these activities consume a lot of time thus delaying actual action. Such kind of delay in implementation and action makes it unfitting to adopt planning where swift actions are needed.

Limited Flexibility: One of the major drawbacks of planning is its inflexible nature. Once the plans are made and are implemented in the organization all the processes start working accordingly so do the employees. In case any need arises due to certain circumstances, it becomes problematic for the management to make changes in the plan, as any change would mean starting everything afresh. Such inflexibility may be categorized further in two forms i.e. ‘Internal or Organizational inflexibility’ and ‘External or Environmental inflexibility’.

Internal inflexibility is because of the fact that the plans are being followed and processed by the organization and employees, and making changes would cause loss of time and efforts with additional cost and delayed goal achievement.

Likewise, external inflexibility arises because of the changes in government policies and regulations, technological advancements, competition, etc. Once there are changes in the external environment of the business it becomes necessary to modify the plans to suit the prevailing business conditions, however it is not as easy as it may sound.

Psychological Barriers: Whole planning process is prepared by managers and implemented by employees, where all are human beings. Wherever, humans are involved there exists psychology, emotions, mindsets, etc. Planning needs the cooperative and whole hearted determinations of the managers and employees for it to be a success. However, in general managers do not get proper feedback, suggestions and co-operation from their subordinates likewise subordinates feel lack of trust and appreciation from their superiors. With this kind of mindset it becomes challenging to make planning a success.

Limited Practicability: Planning is an intellectual process which involves lot and lots of deliberations and discussions before forming any concrete solution or plan. However, there are only a few plans that are implemented successfully in the business organization. Thus, many of the scholars are of the view that instead of investing more efforts on planning managers should invest time and efforts on making its implementation practically successful.

Limited Creativity/ Initiative: Another drawback of planning includes the lack of creativity and initiative among employees. As is known, planning once implemented is to be followed by the employees in order to achieve the organizational objectives. This makes the employees a blind followers of the pre-determined plans, which hinders their capability of initiative ideas and suggestions. This also discourages any creativity on part of the employees, which can possibly be beneficial for the organization.

Conclusion:

The above discussed points substantiate the facts that ‘planning is not a substitute to success’ as it suffers from certain drawbacks. However, it does not mean that mangers should circumvent planning, rather they should try to plan considering the limitation of planning and should try to overcome it with creative ideas.