Planning: A Personal View and Some Practical Considerations

ASTRACT: Because planning is often viewed as being external to the total management process, planning activities are often isolated from the management system within which they take place and which they are intended to serve. As a result, the use and utility of the planning product as a tool for management decision making and a more rational approach to the allocation of society's resources are sig nificantly diminished. To a large extent, the "drug crisis" and society's response to it has suffered from this isolation of planning activity from the management process. This article addresses the practical side of the process as it actually takes place and concentrates on the major factors that affect the ultimate use, or nonuse, of the product. More specifically, it describes the various purposes for research data in the area of drugs and social policy; defines and describes the different types of planning activities that may be used to obtain the data needed; describes the major approaches to planning as currently utilized; highlights some of the problems in current planning activities; and recommends some improvements that can be made in the planning process and in the use of its products.