WIKI Title:  WIKI: How to Plan 

Description:  WIKI on the Planning Process 

 
 
What is Planning? 

Planning is a process that enables an individual to systematically achieve an

intended outcome. Do you know that you actually plan subconsciously? Every day,
you plan how to get from one place to another. When you go to school, you plan what
time to wake up, what to wear, how much money to bring, etc. You do this in your
head, but did you know that your brain actually follows a process when you do this?

One problem of doing all the planning in our head is that we tend to miss or overlook
important things. A plan is usually made up of many steps, sub-steps, and resources
that need to be monitored and updated on a regular basis. Our brain can’t store this
all in memory and that is why we need to put our plans somewhere where we can
review, monitor progress, and update it.
Why do I need to learn how to plan? 

You have many things you want to accomplish in your life don’t you? Perhaps you
want to own a house, a car, or run your own business someday. We call these Goals.
We have many goals in life but most of them fail to become a reality because of poor,
inadequate, or no planning! As one French writer said “A goal without a plan is just a
wish”. Planning allows you to monitor your progress towards an intended goal. It
would be very hard to accomplish anything of significance without it.
What does planning look like? 

Listed below are two Sample Action Plans:

Sample 1
Sample 2
Which one do you think is more effective?

When going on a trip anywhere, it is important that you prepare for the trip. The
videos below will show you a couple that went on two different trips.
[VIDEO 1]
[VIDEO 2]

Below is a sample scenario of coming up with a plan to have a night out with friends.
SAMPLE: Night Out with Friends
How do I plan effectively? 
The planning method you will use is based on the Natural Planning Process from
David Allen. This states that the mind goes through a natural process when you start
thinking of a plan. Attached below is the Action Plan Template that you can use in
order to create a plan.

[VIDEO]

The planning process can be divided into 5 tasks:

1. Identify the Goal/Purpose
2. Visualize The Outcome
3. Make A List Of Ideas
4. Develop and Organize Ideas into Tasks
5. Determine your Next Action

STEP 1: Identify the Goal/Purpose:

The first step in creating a plan would be to set a goal. What are you trying to achieve
with your plan? This will help you evaluate tasks that you are performing in order to
see whether they are helping you achieve your goal or not. When setting a goal, you
will need to make sure that the goal is something that you can complete within a
specific timeframe. Setting a timeframe is important so that you are aware that time is
a resource that is involved in planning. Write this on the Goal section of the
TEMPLATE: Action Plan.

STEP 2: Visualize the Outcome:

This is a step that a lot of people will not think about. Visualizing the outcome is
important because it gives you a clear picture of what accomplishing your goal will
look like, feel like, and sound like. It is also important that when you are working as
part of the team, you all visualize the same goal. The reason for this is because even
if you all have the same goals, how you picture the outcome may be different. Write
this in the Outcome section of the TEMPLATE: Action Plan.

For example, once you have learn how to play the guitar, you would be able to look
at a sheet of guitar chords and be able to play the song on your own. Songs played
will not sound like broken records that have weird pauses.

STEP 3: Make a List of Ideas:

Come up with ideas that will help you achieve the outcome. For example, if you want
to be able to play a song on the guitar, you start thinking, do you need to download
the musical score of the song, download the chords, get a copy of the chords from
someone, or try to learn to play it by ear.

You will begin listing down all the ideas that you have come up with that will help you
achieve your goal. At this stage, you will have to just list everything down without
screening them, you will screen the ideas during the next step. Think about where
you are and where you are going. Think about the journey. This will help frame the
ideas that you will generate. Without proper framing, you might end up wasting
precious time by coming up with ideas that are actually not that useful because they
are not realistic or applicable.

STEP 4: Develop and Organize Ideas into Tasks:

After making a list of the ideas, you can now begin to organize them into tasks. Sort
through the list of ideas that you have listed in your mind and start deciding which of
the ideas are important. You will have to decide which action will take the most
amount of time to perform as well as which task will be the most critical to your goal.
Remove the ideas that you find do not contribute to the achievement of your goal.

If you are a part of a group, determine who will be accountable for each of the tasks.
You will also sort the tasks. Which ones are the most important and how much time
each task will take. You will also start setting dates when you expect to accomplish
the tasks and remove the tasks that you find are not necessary to accomplish the
goal.

Write the tasks that you’ve come up with on the Task column of the TEMPLATE:
Action Plan. In the same row as the task, write down who among the members of the
group is responsible for accomplishing the task. The Who column of the template
doesn’t only have to be one person. It can be multiple members. Enter the date
 when the task should be completed on the When column. Enter any notes in the
Remarks column. This can be for any potential issues that you have encountered and
if there are any delays.

Evaluate each of the tasks and determine whether each task is of high, medium, or
low priority. High priority tasks need to be accomplished as soon as possible and will
have the most impact on the goal. Low priority tasks usually have a longer time to
complete and not have as much impact on the goal.

STEP 5: Determine your Next Action:

Once you have your list of tasks, you have to decide how to begin putting your plan
into action. You or your group will have to decide, after coming up with the plan, what
is the next thing that you will do to move you closer to the goal. For example, when
you want to learn how to play the guitar, you determine that your next action is to go
to the store and get a guitar. Update your Action Plan with the status of the tasks. In
Progress would be for tasks you’re currently trying to complete. Not Started would be
for tasks you have not yet begun to do. Completed would be for tasks that you have
already finished.
 
 

Additional Resources 

TEMPLATE: Action Plan

 

Cited Resources 

Images from FreePik.com

TEDxTalks. "Getting in Control and Creating Space | David Allen | TEDxAmsterdam

2014." YouTube. YouTube, 28 Nov. 2014. Web. 07 Apr. 2016.
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kOSFxKaqOm4>.