corporate planning kosten

Corporate Planning Kosten

Corporate Planning ist nach eigenen Angaben eine Finanzplanungs-Software für das operative Controlling. Die Controlling-Software bietet Nutzer:innen mit Corporate Planner, Corporate Planner Finance, Corporate Planner Cash sowie einem Web-Client und einem Dashboard alles, was in den Bereichen Planung und Budgetierung, Analyse und Reporting benötigt wird. Zudem enthält Corporate Planning über 300 vorinstallierte betriebswirtschaftliche Funktionen. Die Corporate Planner Cash Lizenz ist kostenlos erhältlich und kann für 2.900 Euro mit dem Kick-Start-Paket geupgraded werden.

Corporate Planning Preise

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Corporate Planning

Corporate planning is crucial to any professional’s or business’s success as it sets a vision for daily operations. With corporate planning, businesses prepare a detailed road map for all their activities. By understanding corporate planning, you can effectively lead and manage a business. This article delves into the nitty-gritty of corporate strategic planning, its varying types, and the stages involved in creating a comprehensive corporate plan.

Defining Corporate Planning

Corporate planning is a detail-oriented process aimed at helping businesses craft solid strategies to achieve their goals. Companies can thrive by mapping out a clear direction, making informed decisions, identifying obstacles, and efficiently allocating resources to support business activities. 

The corporate planning process also helps align teams with a shared mission and overcome challenges to achieve established objectives. It is an ongoing, dynamic, and continuous process that continually adapts to shifting business dynamics throughout the lifespan of a company.

Advantages and Disadvantages

Corporate planning consists of extensive future-oriented preparations that provide businesses with a better approach to handling various situations. 

However, like everything, there are advantages and disadvantages to the continuous corporate planning process that need to be considered. Below, let’s explore the advantages and disadvantages of corporate planning in detail:

Advantages:

Reduces Uncertainty: Running a business comes with constant uncertainties and risks . An excellent corporate plan goes beyond merely setting objectives. It helps the company by forecasting the value of risks in the future, thereby minimizing the risk of uncertainty and unplanned contingencies.

Unity: Corporate planning helps the employees understand their roles more explicitly. Employees who know what’s expected of them are less likely to engage in conflicts, leading to higher levels of unity within the organization.

Aids Growth: With employee cooperation and constant development of processes within the company’s scope, corporate strategy, and plan objectives are easier to implement, resulting in a higher success rate.

Disadvantages:

Rigidity: Following a strict set of rules as part of a plan can create an inflexible environment that can lower employees’ morale, which can ultimately interfere with productivity.

Time: Corporate planning can take quite some time before the company begins to see results. The process involves collecting data, devising a plan, implementing, monitoring, and evaluating.

Ambiguity: Although corporate planning provides a reference point for business decisions, it is based on predictions of a mutable future. As a result, the plan may only sometimes be foolproof, and unexpected situations can occur, leaving businesses caught off-guard.

The Different Types of Corporate Planning

Corporate planning is a vital aspect of any business, and it involves a variety of planning types, including:

Strategic Planning:

Strategic planning is a crucial process that requires closely examining a company’s missions, strengths, and weaknesses. Its goal is to define the company’s current status, determine where it wants to go, and how it can get there. Although strategic planning and corporate planning share some overlapping areas, corporate planning has a broader scope.

It is particularly useful in functional planning and guiding complex organizations with various subsidiaries and businesses. The corporate plan also includes the same critical components as the strategic plan, focusing on the broader company and any related services used by the departments, such as marketing and human resources. Corporate planning also considers tools for achieving individual business steps such as countering challenges, employee training, and objectives.

Tactical Planning: 

Tactical planning is the subsequent step businesses take after formulating a strategic plan. Tactical planning involves defining goals and determining the necessary steps and actions required to achieve them. With it, you can subdivide the strategic plan into smaller objectives and goals. It is a short-term planning process and strategy that can aid in working towards medium or long-term goals.

Operational Planning:

Operational planning is a specific, detailed plan that outlines the business activities’ day-to-day workings for a specific period, generally lasting more than a year. It specifies employees’ and managers’ daily responsibilities and tasks and the workflow. Operational planning is useful in allocating the available financial, physical, and human resources to reach short-term strategic objectives that support an organization’s growth.

Contingency Planning:

Contingency planning is the process of developing strategies that help businesses respond effectively to unexpected disruptive events. It is intended to ensure that the practices return to standard operating procedures after a disturbance or natural disaster. Contingency planning is an effective tool for handling both adverse and positive events, such as an unexpected financial boost that can impact the organization’s operations.

By incorporating these types of business planning, businesses can ensure success in the short term and achieve long-term growth.

Examples of Corporate Planning :

Audacity Corporation, a renowned studio, and live performance microphones manufacturer, wanted to ensure that their range of microphones for streamers and gamers were market leaders by the end of the financial year. 

Their CEO, Brendon, decided to study their competitors’ practices and strategies to achieve this target. They discovered that most of their competitors produced these microphones in-house, and their costs of raw materials were high.

To counter this, Audacity collaborated with companies in China and Taiwan to obtain raw materials at reduced prices and trained their employees to assemble the products more efficiently. As a result, their streaming and gaming microphones became the top-selling product in the market, with 20% more sales than their nearest competitor.

ExxonMobil, one of the largest oil and gas companies operating internationally, announced its corporate plans in 2022. One of their declarations was the plan to increase investments in emission reduction solutions. 

They have decided to invest $17 billion by 2027 in this domain to achieve this objective. This investment will enable them to gain a competitive advantage over their contemporaries in the market and help them tackle climate change and carbon emissions in the long run.

The Benefits of Corporate Planning

Providing clear objectives.

Not only does corporate planning provide a sense of direction for professionals within an organization and corporate management, but it also ensures that every action taken has a purpose. Executing tasks with a clear plan can help achieve business objectives efficiently.

Formulating Better Strategies

In the context of business, a strategy is an approach taken to achieve a specific goal or objective. For example, if the objective is to make a product the category leader in sales revenue by the year 2023, a potential strategy could be to persuade buyers that the product is superior to other options on the market by investing in large advertising campaigns. Corporate planning is integral to helping an organization create operational plans and execute strategies in a logical and methodical manner, easing the decision-making process.

Increasing Communication

Corporate planning allows group participation in scenario planning, improving communication between employees and employers. Active involvement ensures that tasks are executed efficiently, and everyone remains on the same page.

Allocating Resources Efficiently

In the context of business, a strategy is an approach taken to achieve a specific goal or objective. For example, if the objective is to make a product the category leader in sales revenue by the year 2023, a potential strategy could be to persuade buyers that the product is superior to other options on the market by investing in large advertising campaigns. Corporate planning is integral to helping an organization create and execute strategies in a logical and methodical manner, easing the decision-making process.

Communicating Brand Messaging

A well-defined corporate plan can help communicate a brand’s message to key stakeholders like shareholders, investors, creditors, customers, and employees. By aligning mission and vision statements, core values are clearly established, helping to convey the brand message cohesively.

By implementing corporate planning, organizations can enjoy these benefits and ultimately operate with enhanced efficiency and productivity.

The Six Stages of Corporate Planning

Start with a vision and mission statement.

A vision statement showcases future expectations for a company, such as a goal to offer innovative mobility solutions on a global scale.

On the other hand, a mission statement outlines the organization’s purpose, including target audience, product offerings, and distinguishing factors from competitors. For instance, our company is dedicated to facilitating low-interest healthcare loans to those with poor credit, specifically for low-income households.

Establish Clear-Cut Goals and Objectives

Although people sometimes use the terms interchangeably, goals and objectives have significant distinctions. Fundamentally, a goal defines the aspiration of a company or business over a specific period, while an objective is a measurable and actionable step that propels you toward your goal.

While general goals may suffice for organizations, departments need detailed and specific ones to achieve targets. 

For example, a business objective to boost profits would require more specific departmental goals, such as, “We will generate an additional $8,000 in revenue by November 15.” You can create a shared future vision by setting company goals and objectives. This allows everyone to work together towards common goals, making their daily activities more purposeful.

Identify your Organization’s Strengths and Weaknesses

Once you’ve established your business goals and objectives, analyzing the organization’s strengths and weaknesses is a good idea. The most commonly adopted approach for this is the SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats) analysis.

To perform a SWOT analysis, list the characteristics corresponding to each category. Based on this evaluation, you can capitalize on the strengths identified and leverage your opportunities to counter or neutralize the weaknesses and potential threats to the organization. 

This kind of analysis will enable you to determine any potential challenges impeding the business goals and help you develop strategies to overcome them. In summary, incorporating a SWOT analysis into your business strategy is an effective way to better understand the organization’s internal and external environment, helping you achieve business growth and success.

Consider Short-term and Long-term Goals

Short-term goals are ones you can achieve in the near future, usually between six months and two years. Long-term goals require more time, usually three to five years. By integrating these two types of goals, you can achieve your goals with ease.

Implement the Plan

After clearly understanding your goals, the next step is to proceed with the plan’s implementation. At this stage, an action plan is usually created with specific responsibilities and an expected timeline for achieving each objective. Regular meetings should be set up to monitor this plan effectively to review progress on the action plans and key performance indicators (KPIs). It’s important to note that during implementation, setbacks or challenges may arise, which is why regular check-ins are necessary. These reviews also allow for recognizing successes and making any necessary corrections.

Evaluate Performance

After implementing all plans, the subsequent critical step involves evaluating their performance. Its purpose is to align your overall expectations with the actual contributions of your plans. Evaluating plan performance is necessary because it helps you measure progress and surface possible areas of weakness. Therefore, to ensure continual improvement towards your goals and maximize impact, evaluating implemented plans’ outcomes is a must.

Corporate Planning Tips :

Share your plan broadly.

For a corporate plan to succeed, the entire company’s involvement is crucial. It’s essential to guarantee that every team member is given access to the business plan and encouraged to participate. Additionally, sharing the plan with board members and department leaders can ensure accountability and commitment and help maintain a clear pathway to achieve the plan’s objectives.

Divide Yearly Plans into Quarters

To simplify a plan, break it down into manageable priorities with deadlines. You can assess the plan’s progress more easily by increasing the frequency of check-ins. If you encounter a challenge, you can make necessary changes to the quarterly plans to keep yourself on track.

Utilize Action Plans

Action plans keep you motivated and on target toward achieving your goals. They help you complete short-term goals in a reasonable amount of time, keeping you moving toward your final objective.

Hold Regular Meetings

Regular check-ins to revise your goals and key performance indicators (KPIs) are crucial. Make necessary adjustments to your corporate plan, find solutions, and achieve your KPIs promptly and efficiently.

To learn more about corporate planning, corporate visions, and more, contact Strategy Capstone !

Corporate Planning: What Is It and How Is It Important?

by Go Together DMC | nov 17, 2023 | DMC Brazil | 0 Comments

Business success doesn't happen by chance. It requires a well-thought-out strategy, meticulous execution, and a keen understanding of the corporate landscape. This is where corporate planning comes into play. As an essential element of organizational success, corporate planning shapes the direction, goals, and future of a company. In this blog post, we'll delve into the various aspects of corporate planning, emphasizing its importance in the modern business environment. Furthermore, we'll explore the role of incentive travel, specifically with a focus on DMC Brazil, as a powerful tool in boosting employee morale and achieving organizational goals.

Understanding Corporate Planning:

Corporate planning is a strategic process that involves defining an organization's objectives and developing plans and policies to achieve them. It involves strategy definition, strategy direction, decision-making and resource allocation and is a roadmap that guides decision-making at all levels of the organization, ensuring that every action contributes to the overall success of the company. This process encompasses various facets, including financial planning, market analysis, risk management, and resource allocation. It can also help you identify potential challenges in meeting goals, so you can provide methods to overcome them. Corporate planning is a continuous and dynamic process that lasts throughout the life of the business

Key Aspects of Corporate Planning

Strategic Vision: Lies at the core of corporate planning and involves setting long-term goals and defining the steps needed to reach them. The corporate strategic planning process evaluates the resources available to the company and identifies gaps that you will need to fill to drive business results. These could be gaps within tangible resources (inventory, technology, or headcount) or intangible (institutional knowledge or role-specific skills). A well-defined vision provides clarity to the organization, aligning the efforts of employees towards a common purpose.

Financial Planning: It is the process of assessing the current financial situation of a business to identify future financial goals and how to achieve them. The financial plan itself is a document that serves as a roadmap for a company's financial growth. It reflects the current status of the business, what progress they intend to make, and how they intend to make it.

It also enables a business to determine how it will afford to achieve its objectives and strategic goals. A business typically sets a vision and objectives, and then immediately creates a financial plan to support those goals. The financial plan describes all of the resources and activities that the company will require-and the expected timeframes-for achieving these objectives.

Market Analysis: Understanding the market is essential for staying competitive. Corporate planning includes a comprehensive analysis of market trends, consumer behavior, and competitor activities, allowing companies to adapt and innovate. A market analysis also provides insights into potential customers and your competition, and its core components are:

• Industry analysis: Assesses the general industry environment in which you compete
• Target market analysis: Identifies and quantifies the customers that you will be targeting for sales
• Competitive analysis: Identifies your competitors and analyzes their strengths and weaknesses.

Risk Management: Every planning process and every planning usually ends in a calculated future variant. From the infinite possibilities of future developments, the most probable variant (or most relevant entrepreneurial variant) must be found in the planning process. Often only single risks are considered in the planning process. Often the planners try to plan the "least risky" or "safest" variant. The planning process should encourage creativity and spur the organization on to new top performances. So, identifying and mitigating risks is an integral part of corporate planning.

Benefits of a well-developed corporate plan

We can summarize why planning is key to managers and their businesses with a quite simple reason: it provides direction for daily actions. Understanding corporate planning can help you successfully manage a business or help you work more effectively. Here's just three of its many fundamental reasons:

• It provides clear objectives for the organization

Corporate planning creates a sense of direction for professionals working at an organization. It lets you take every action with certainty since there's a plan guiding every action. You can also easily understand when you're working towards business objectives.

• It helps formulate better strategies using a logical approach

A strategy is an approach you take towards achieving a business goal or objective. For instance, if your objective is to make a product a category leader in sales revenue by the year 2023, the strategy might be to persuade buyers that the product is the best in the market by investing in large advertisement campaigns for the product. Corporate planning helps you ease the process of formulating strategies since it follows a logical and methodical approach. It also eases the decision-making process.

• It increases communication between employees and employers

Corporate planning eases the group participation process for planning decisions. This leads to a better understanding of the plans and the strategies, which ensures that employees perform the tasks better. It also ensures that you get feedback from your team. Understanding the areas where they need help increases efficiency and improves overall workplace culture.

Now, Enters Incentive Travel as a Motivational Tool

While corporate planning sets the foundation for success, employee motivation plays a crucial role in achieving organizational goals. Incentive travel is a powerful tool that can significantly boost employee morale and contribute to goal achievement. Go Together DMC Brazil recognizes the importance of incentive travel as a means to reward and motivate employees.

• Recognition and Appreciation: Incentive travel serves as a tangible reward for employees who contribute to the success of the organization. It is a way of recognizing their efforts and expressing appreciation for their hard work.
• Team Building: Travel experiences create opportunities for team building and bonding. Shared adventures and experiences contribute to stronger team cohesion, fostering a positive and collaborative work environment.
• Enhanced Productivity: Motivated and engaged employees are more likely to be productive. Incentive travel acts as a catalyst for increased productivity by providing employees with a sense of purpose and accomplishment.
• Goal Alignment: Incentive travel programs can be designed to align with organizational goals. This ensures that the rewards offered are not only motivating but also contribute to the overall success of the company.

Corporate planning is the backbone of organizational success, providing a roadmap for sustainable growth and adaptability in a rapidly changing business environment. But incorporating incentive travel into corporate planning can be a game-changer for employee motivation and goal achievement.

Incorporating incentive travel into corporate planning transforms employee motivation from a mere concept into a tangible, transformative force. By recognizing the individuality of employees, fostering team collaboration, and aligning rewards with personal and organizational goals, business can create a motivated, engaged, and high-performing workforce. This, in turn, becomes a driving force behind the achievement of corporate objectives and long-term success.

Seeking advice from DMCs is a strategic move for companies looking to optimize their events and travel-related activities. Our team at Go Together DMC possess Brazil in-depth knowledge and expertise and a team skilled to offer invaluable solutions when it comes to navigating cultural nuances, understanding local regulations, and recommending unique experiences that may not be apparent to outsiders.

Contact us and let's start crafting an incentive travel perfectly aligned with your corporate plan. Brazil, with its unique blend of natural beauties, hospitality and cultural relevance, can be the game changer you and your company were looking for.

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Corporate planning

Corporate planning is one of the core tasks of management and controlling in a company. This term encompasses a large number of processes in which future structures or procedures are defined based on existing key figures. These defined measures should be implemented in realistic sub-periods in order to achieve the set goals. A software solution for corporate planning enables the implementation of all methods of planning internal and external influencing factors that affect a company.

4 Outline points of corporate planning

• Budget plan: summary of costs and revenues or profit or loss for the year.
• Balance sheet plan: summary of the build-up of liabilities and then the determination of the company capital
• Investment plan: summary of investments and deinvestments of fixed assets
• Financial plan: Summary of cash flows associated with these plans.

Before the introduction of CoPlanner, we worked with Excel. Here, multidimensionality was not available to the extent that it is currently possible. The different export markets, customers and the multitude of our products pushed the limits of Excel.

Integrated corporate planning with CoPlanner

With CoPlanner business planning is no art:

• more than 250 ready-made tables already in the standard solution
• more than 500 integrated formulas and functions
• more than 50 OLAP cubes
• free hierarchical structure per dimension
• move by drag & drop

Mask design

CoPlanner - layout as you like it:

• predefined standard masks for recording different planning activities
• free mask design for different user groups (e.g. sales, cost center, investment planning) via the mask designer

Freely selectable planning horizon

Rolling, sub- or multi-year planning on a monthly, quarterly and annual basis. CoPlanner knows no limits. Even daily data (e.g. from cash register systems in retail) can be displayed.

Scenario Manager

CoPlanner facilitates planning through simulations and different plan versions.

New budgeting approaches

CoPlanner - the new controlling style:

• Top down and bottom up planning
• Quick planning from actual or forecast data
• Wizard-driven distribution functions
• Trend calculations and key figure control
• Planning of individual elements
• Planning on one or more aggregate levels

Multidimensional planning

New dimensions in corporate planning: Based on OLAP cubes, all planning dimensions such as profit centers, cost centers, products, customers, regions, etc. can be freely defined. Mea-sures such as quantities, prices, absolute values, actual, plan and forecast data round off the planning information.

Customizing

New design dimensions with CoPlanner: With table designer, formula designer, masks and dimension designer, standard defaults can be changed at any time, but also supplemented as desired.

user-based security concept

Only defined authorized persons can access the data. Authorizations can be controlled via menu structures, dimensions, dimension elements and activity profiles (read/write).

Selection of an integrated Planning Software

If corporate planning is to be set up in the company or integrated planning is to be carried out, the question arises first: On which system will the planning be carried out, which software or IT tools will be used? According to the annual reports of the independent consultancy BARC , Excel is currently ranked number 1, but the professional planning tools, including CoPlanner, are becoming increasingly flexible and are relocating 100% of their software to the Web. With the use of professional software solutions for corporate planning, a much higher user satisfaction can be achieved in many areas than with Microsoft Excel .

STEP-Analysis

The internal and external influencing factors generally fall under the well-known STEP analysis, which deals with political, economic, social, legal and environmental factors. In business, it lists the factors of the individual categories, which can have an influence on the respective company. The use of this STEP analysis serves to closely examine a market and the associated market opportunities. Influencing factors that occur regularly are part of operational management. Meanwhile, those that affect events, opportunities, and challenges that are happening for the first time are now assigned to project management.

Corporate Planning is more than just ERP

Unlike enterprise resource planning (ERP), another framework is covered in corporate planning systems. Corporate planning systems address the resources that are barely available or unavailable to a business and the ability to create products or resources or provide services. It also takes account factors that positively or negatively impact the company's ability to perform these operations.

Industry Solutions for corporate Planning

CoPlanner is a specialist in the field of corporate planning and develops individual, innovative and sectoral solutions in partnership with its customers, supplemented by expert advice and training.

Learn more ...

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Together we will discuss your professional requirements for business planning, consolidation , personnel cost planning, cost/performance accounting or reporting and we will show you the benefits of a standardized but flexible solution.

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Corporate Planning: An Essential Guide to Strategic Management

Table of Contents

Corporate planning is a vital component of strategic management, as it helps organizations identify their objectives and allocate resources to achieve them. In this blog, we will explore the nature and scope of corporate planning, the steps involved in the planning process, and the benefits of effective corporate planning.

What is Corporate Planning?

Corporate planning is the process of defining an organization’s mission, objectives, strategies, and tactics for achieving its goals. It involves assessing the current state of the organization, identifying opportunities and threats in the external environment, and developing a plan to guide the organization towards its desired future state.

The Steps Involved in Corporate Planning

Effective corporate planning requires a structured approach, which typically involves the following steps:

• Situation analysis: Assessing the internal and external environment of the organization to identify strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats (SWOT analysis).
• Mission and objectives: Defining the organization’s purpose and desired outcomes.
• Strategy development: Identifying and evaluating strategic options, and selecting the most appropriate strategy for achieving the organization’s objectives.
• Action planning: Developing a detailed plan of action, including timelines, resource allocation, and performance metrics.
• Implementation: Executing the plan and monitoring progress towards the desired outcomes.
• Evaluation and control: Assessing the success of the plan and making adjustments as needed to ensure continued progress towards the desired outcomes.

The Benefits of Effective Corporate Planning

Effective corporate planning can provide a range of benefits for organizations, including:

• Clarity of purpose: Clearly defining the organization’s mission and objectives can help align all stakeholders around a common goal.
• Resource optimization: Identifying and prioritizing strategic initiatives can help organizations allocate resources effectively.
• Risk management: Assessing potential risks and developing contingency plans can help organizations prepare for unexpected challenges.
• Continuous improvement: Regular evaluation of progress and making adjustments as needed can help organizations continuously improve their performance and achieve their goals.

Corporate planning is an essential component of strategic management, as it helps organizations clarify their objectives and allocate resources effectively to achieve them. By following a structured approach to corporate planning, organizations can improve their performance, manage risks, and continuously improve their operations.

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Advanced Strategic Management

1 Corporate Management: An Overview

• Nature and Scope of Corporate Management
• Corporate Planning
• Implementation of Corporate Plan
• Review and Evaluation of Corporate Plan
• Approches to Corporate Management
• Strategists and their role in Corporate Management
• Need for Corporate Management
• Corporate Management in Non Business Organisations

2 Corporate Policy

• Concept and Meaning of Corporate Policy
• Features of Corporate Policy
• Determinants of Corporate Policy
• Scope of Corporate Policy
• Policy Formulation Process
• Classification of Corporate Policy
• Importance of Corporate Policy

3 Intensive Growth Strategies

• Nature and Scope of Corporate Strategies
• Nature of Stability Strategy
• Expansion Strategies
• Expansion through Intensification
• Expansion through Integration
• International Expansion

4 Integrated and Diversification Growth Strategies

• Diversification
• Related Diversification (Concentric Diversification)
• Unrelated Diversification (Conglomerate Diversification)
• Rationale for Diversification
• Alternative Routes to Diversification
• Mergers and Acquisitions (M&A)
• Merger and Acquisition Strategy
• Reasons for Failure of Merger and Acquisition
• Steps in Merger and Acquisition Deals
• Mergers and Acquisitions: The Indian Scenario

5 Strategic Alliances

• Strategic Alliance Trends
• Factors Promoting the Rise of Strategic Alliances
• Types of Strategic Alliances
• Benefits of Strategic Alliances
• Costs and Risks of Strategic Alliances
• Factors Contributing to Successful Alliances
• Planning for a Successful Alliance
• Corporate Social Responsibility

6 Internationalization Process

• Reasons for Internationalization
• Stages of Internationalization
• Operating Advantages and Disadvantages of MNCs
• Models of International Trade

7 Evaluation of Markets and Risk Assessment

• Political, Financial and Economic Risks in International Business
• Risk Assessment
• Causes of Risk
• Risk Management Techniques

8 Entry into the International Markets

• Entry Strategies
• Government Involvement in Trade Restrictions and Incentives

9 IT and Strategy

• IT and Strategy
• Use of IT in Strategy Implementation
• IT for Innovation and Performance
• IT in Service Sector

10 Technology and R&D

• Technology and R&D in Organisations
• Features of Technology Package
• Competitive Strategy and Competitiveness
• Competitive Advantage and R&D
• Value Chain and Value Chain Analysis
• Development of R&D Strategy
• Steps Involved in Developing R&D Strategy
• Progress of R&D Organizations in Strategy Development

11 Knowledge Management (KM)

• Knowledge and Knowledge Management
• Sources of Knowledge
• Knowledge Creation
• Knowledge Management Framework
• Benefits of Knowledge Management
• Pioneers in Knowledge Management
• KM Initiatives in Indian Organizations
• Software for Knowledge Management
• Trends and Challenges in Knowledge Management

12 Innovation

• Concepts of Innovation and Creativity
• Factors Influencing Creativity and Innovation
• Characteristics of Innovative Organizations
• The Individual and Innovation Culture
• Fostering Creativity and the Creative Process
• Techniques for Enhancing Creativity
• Building Creative Organizations
• Company Programmes to Enhance Creativity

Essential Elements of a Dynamic Corporate Plan

Table of contents, is a corporate plan the same as a business plan, why does my business need a corporate plan, trends in creating corporate plan sets, strategic trade-offs.

In the dynamic and rapidly changing business landscape, staying on top of everything and continuously generating innovative ideas and strategies to drive your company’s progress can be overwhelming. This is where the significance of a well-crafted corporate plan becomes evident. Considered the guiding roadmap for your organisation, a strategic corporate plan helps support your company’s objectives, goals and the necessary steps to achieve them.

A strategic corporate plan is a comprehensive and forward-looking document that lays out the goals, objectives and actionable steps a company needs to take to develop its vision .

It serves as a blueprint, guiding the firm through the complexities of today’s business environment. By outlining clear goals and providing a strategy for success, the corporate plan organises thoughts and fosters a sense of urgency to propel the company forward.

Two fundamental planning approaches are often used when formulating a fair corporate plan: business and corporate planning. While they share the common objective of setting goals for a business, they serve distinct purposes. The development of a comprehensive corporate plan involves a systematic and in-depth assessment of the company’s current state, market conditions and long-term aim.

Business plan vs. corporate plan

Business plan.

It focuses on determining the “what” of your business. It involves formulating a comprehensive roadmap for your company’s present and future aspirations.

This initial planning phase is crucial for a thriving company, especially when launching a new business idea or introducing significant changes to your existing operations. Before delving into specific corporate strategies, you must establish a generalised business plan.

Key elements of a business plan:

• Company mission : Clearly define your company’s mission and purpose.
• SWOT analysis : Assess your company’s strengths and weaknesses to identify areas for development and improvement.
• Goal-setting : Outline short-term and long-term goals related to growth, finances, and other aspects.

Corporate Plan

Corporate planning is the “how” phase that comes after you set your business corporate plan goals. This step involves devising strategies and tactics to support your company’s mission and achieve the defined goals.

It addresses the practical steps needed to make the vision a reality. Key aspects of a strategic corporate plan:

• Alignment with a business plan : Ensure that the corporate plan aligns with the objectives and goals outlined in the business plan.
• Resource utilisation: Plan how you will leverage your company’s strengths and mitigate weaknesses to meet targets.
• Financial analysis: Use financial data, such as cash-flow statements and credit reports, to make informed decisions.
• Operational efficiency: Implement measures to enhance operational effectiveness and optimise business processes.

Long-term goals

Corporate planning involves setting a strategic vision and charting a course of action to achieve it within a specific timeframe. By establishing long-term goals, businesses can remain focused on their objectives while effectively utilising their resources and fostering a collaborative work environment.

With TimeTrack’s’ Task Planner , businesses can break down their strategic vision into actionable tasks and assign them to relevant workforce or individuals. The tool helps set clear deadlines and track progress, enabling the organisation to stay on track, meet priorities and deliver on milestones in a timely manner.

Statista’s 2021 research reveals that a significant 51% of companies are not expanding their workforce as part of their thriving corporate strategy to cope with the current environment. This statistic underscores the urgency for companies to adopt effective corporate strategies to protect and enhance their adaptability in an ever-changing and volatile market environment.

Better decision-making

Strategic workforce planning enables quality decision-making that aligns with the company’s mission statement, promoting fairness throughout the organisation. It encompasses various aspects, including required employee skills and necessary equipment, helping firms hire the right talent, allocate funds wisely and invest in promising opportunities for success.

TimeTrack’s Time Clock facilitates better decision-making by streamlining administrative processes related to time tracking, payroll and attendance. With automated time tracking , firms can increase transparency and eliminate manual errors to ensure fair and accurate employee compensation, contributing to a positive work environment and fostering employee satisfaction.

A measure of success

Corporate planning is vital for measuring a company’s success in achieving its objectives. Regular evaluations and adjustments are made to overcome obstacles and enhance work processes, ensuring optimal efficiency, fairness, quality and efficacy.

Business process transformation is an integral part of a plan that measures an organisation’s success. As the firm evaluates its progress toward achieving its objectives, it identifies areas that need improvement, development or optimisation.

Cost savings for sustainable development

Corporate planning provides the advantage of creating fair budgets that lead to significant savings and ultimately support sustainable development. Through efficient budgeting, organisations can help deliver financial resources to essential projects, eliminate unnecessary expenses, increase income and ensure transparency in fund allocation.

A well-crafted strategic corporate plan acts as a roadmap, keeping the company on track to deliver and accomplish its ultimate objective without getting distracted. The mission statement, an integral part of corporate planning, conveys the organisation’s roles and goals and aims to ensure that the company maintains its direction and evaluates performance to reach its goals.

Creating a vision

Leaders must define the company’s objectives, mission and corporate values to establish a thriving corporate plan for the future. Involving key staff members in the visioning process ensures diverse perspectives and a well-rounded strategic mix. The central aim should look ahead for three to five years and serve as a blueprint for the organisation’s desired future position.

This process aims to create a clear direction for the company and align its actions with its overarching mission, prioritising fairness and inclusivity amongst all stakeholders. By setting clear aims, priorities and objectives, the company can stay focused on its long-term goals and make informed decisions that propel it toward success.

Resource allocation

Resource allocation is a critical aspect of strategic planning, involving both capital and support people. Efficient allocation requires careful consideration of critical factors for each type:

Capital resources

• Develop risk-adjusted returns by allocating resources across businesses.
• Analyse external opportunities, such as mergers and acquisitions, using capital resources.
• Distribute capital resources between internal projects and external opportunities.

People-based resources

• Position leaders and partners strategically to maximise their contribution and value.
• Ensure a steady supply of talent across all business units.
• Define core competencies and allocate resources accordingly.

Following these functions to support people and capital, resources ensure optimal utilisation across the organisation’s portfolio of services.

Setting functional objectives

The visioning aspects must be transformed into clear and actionable functional objectives. These objectives serve as guiding principles and priorities for employees at all levels and should be regularly reviewed to ensure success.

Incorporating a readiness plan is essential during the process of setting functional objectives. A well-prepared readiness plan ensures that transforming visioning aspects into clear, actionable objectives is smooth and effective. This plan involves identifying the necessary resources, training and support people at all levels of the organisation to align with the new objectives.

Organisational design

An effective organisational design supports multiple priorities within the organisation. This process involves aspects like quality reporting, delegation and structuring:

• Develop centres of excellence.
• Establish structures for governance.
• Define reporting structures, such as top-down or matrix reporting.
• Delegate authority appropriately.
• Allocate responsibilities to balance exposure and return levels.
• Integrate business units and eliminate redundancies through mergers.
• Break down significant commitments and initiatives into smaller projects.
• Determine decision-making processes (bottom-up or top-down).
• Balance business unit autonomy with authority over decisions in partners.

Considering these aspects ensures delivering a well-structured workforce and efficient organisational design.

Portfolio management

Portfolio management evaluates the organisation’s business units, interactions and decisions to enter or exit specific businesses. Key aspects of portfolio management include:

• Strategic planning for future opportunities and investments.
• Market assessment to support competitive advantages and portfolio balance.
• Decision-making on resource allocation among business units.
• Develop diversified companies for risk management.
• Determining the level of vertical integration.

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Strategic trade-offs serve three functions: creating incentives, generating cash and managing threats. Incentive structures play a vital role in managing risk and return levels. To deliver long-term success, it’s essential to separate risk management responsibilities from return generation.

High-risk strategies, such as true product differentiation or cost leadership, may lead to high returns. Successful execution and structured plans are essential for delivering these plays. Managing exposure effectively involves priorities like communication, transparency and autonomy for business units to develop and address comprehensive risk management strategies.

Organisations sometimes emulate other companies to mitigate threats and create viable opportunities, particularly in high-risk strategies like true product differentiation, which can lead to market leadership or collapse. These key aims guide decision-making and resource allocation, ensuring that the company optimises its potential for success while navigating potential challenges with informed and strategic approaches.

Corporate plan sets are a fundamental and integral activity that significantly contributes to develop an organisation’s goals through sustainable development.

At every level and department, clear and detailed strategies are implemented with the key aims in mind, and employees are assigned specific tasks and deadlines to follow. These tasks are executed under the guidance of leaders, partners, and mentors, ensuring successful completion for a thriving business, all while adhering to established guidelines. The organisation’s overarching aims serve as the driving force behind each strategic decision, creating a cohesive and purpose-driven work environment that propels the company toward its desired outcomes.

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Corporate Planning

Corporate Planning may be defined as the process of deciding long term goals and objectives within the ambit of organisation’s strength and weaknesses in the existing and prospective environmental setting to ensure their achievement either by integrating the short term and long term plans or by adopting such measures which may bring even structural changes in the composition of the organisation, after taking recourse to finan­cial resources.

Learn about:- 1. Introduction to Corporate Planning 2. Definitions of Corporate Planning 3. Characteristics 4. Scope 5. Need 6. Basic Premises 7. Factors for the Success of Corporate Planning

8. Major Practices 9. Process 10. Steps 11. Difference between Strategic Planning and Corporate Planning 12. Reasons which Lead to the Failure of Corporate Planning 13. Limitations.

Corporate Planning: Introduction, Definitions, Characteristics, Scope, Need, Process, Steps and Limitations

Corporate planning – introduction.

Corporate planning in a sense may be stated as Strategic Planning as described by a number of writers including Stenier. In spite of the difference in the concepts of long range planning and Corporate Planning. Stenier, Miner and Gray have used Corporate Planning and long range planning synonymously. Such conceptual similarity may not necessarily obliterate the conceptual difference between the two terms; we will maintain the difference for our analysis.

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D.E. Hussey while defining Corporate Planning stated that “Corporate long range planning, is not a technique, it is a complete way of running a business. Under it, the future implication of every decision is evaluated in advance of implementation. Standards of performance are set up beyond the time horizon of the annual budget. The company clearly defines what it is trying to achieve. A continued study is made of the environment in which the company operates so that the changing patterns are seen in advance and incorporated into the company’s decision process.”

According to Dr. Scott “Strategic Long range Planning is a systematic approach by a given company to making decisions about issues which are of fundamental and crucial importance to its continuing long term health and vitality. The fundamental and crucial importance of issues is derived from the fact that they provide an underlying and unifying basis for all other plans to be developed within the company, over a determinate period of time. Thus a long range strategy is designed to provide information about a company’s basic direction and purpose which will serve as a guide for all the operational activities of that company.”

Likewise, Professor Stoner states that “Strategic Planning is the process of selecting an organisation’s goals, determining the policies and strategic programmes necessary to achieve specific objectives enroute to the goals, and establishing the methods necessary to assume that the policies and strategic programmes are implemented.”

Stoner elaborates further the concept of strategic planning by making distinction with the operational planning. The distinction between the two may be summarised in a few words – “Whereas operational planning focusses on operating planning, problems such as present profit, present resources, environment, efficiency and even low risk, strategic planning focusses on long term survival and development. For this purpose, the emphasis shifts from present to future and from present operation to future growth and development. With the drift from present to future, there ought to be a change from the low risk to high risk.”

Peter Drucker defines corporate planning as a “continuous process of making entrepreneurial decisions systematically and with the least possible knowledge of their fraternity; organ­ising systematically, the effort needed to carry out these decisions; and measuring the results against expectations through organised systematic feedback.”

If we analyse this definition it will contain the following elements to constitute Corporate Planning or Strategic Planning:

1. Laying down long range corporate goals and objectives.

2. Macro and Micro Environments.

3. Strengths and weaknesses of the organisation.

4. Integration between short term and long term plans.

5. Structural changes in the organisation.

6. Implementation of the plan.

7. Optimal use of scarce financial resources.

8 Evaluation of performance.

9. Feedback to make corporate planning more effective and purposeful.

Long term goals and objectives pertain to the areas of production, marketing, quality and even cost of production. In the area of production, the company may specifically spell out its goals regarding the volume of production, addition of new products or product lines. This deci­sion may change the structure of the organisation. Similarly the marketing objectives may relate to market spread from domestic to international market.

To achieve the above goals and objectives, the organisation shall have to assess its strengths and weaknesses in relation to competitors and the market forces and other components of macro and micro environments.

After assessing the strengths and weaknesses in the prevailing and prospecting macro and micro en­vironments, the corporation shall have two options before it – One – it may resort to an expansion programme to cope with the growing commitments to the objectives laid down; for this purpose it will be required to push forward the existing plan of action which amounts to integrating short term plans with long term plans.

Two-the other option may be diversification or technological upgradation. In both the cases some structural changes may be needed in the composition of the organisation.

The objectives of strategic planning is to achieve the desired long term objective/ goals by making the optimal use of the scarce resources in men and material.

Evaluation of the plan implementation is necessary to know from the feedback if the execution has been confronted with any blockade in implementing of the plan. If the bottlenecks are experienced they may be removed by taking suitable measures to achieve the desired objective with efficiency, in the light of the feedback received.

Corporate Planning – Definitions

Corporate planning is a sophisticated planning tool. It has been introduced into the corporate world recently, first in USA and later in all advanced industrial countries. A humble beginning has been made in India also. For example, BHEL practices corporate planning vigorously. In simple words, corporate planning is the determination of the long-term goals of a company as a whole and then developing plans to achieve these goals giving due weightage to environmental changes. It is planning for overall organisational performance.

Hussey defines corporate planning as, “the formal process of developing objectives for the corporation and its component parts, evolving alternative strategies to achieve these and doing this against a background of systematic appraisal of internal strengths and weaknesses and external environmental changes, the process of translating strategy into detailed operational plans and seeing that these plans are carried out.”

This is a comprehensive definition of corporate planning which includes deterministic, motivational and directional elements of corporate planning.

In the words of Steiner, “Corporate planning is the process of determining the major objectives of an organisation and the policies and strategies that will govern the acquisition, use and disposition of resources to achieve these objectives.”

According to Drucker, “Corporate planning is the continuous process of making present entrepreneurial (risk-taking) decisions systematically and with the best possible knowledge of their futurity, organising systematically the efforts needed to carry out these decisions; and measuring the results of these decisions against the expectations through organised systematic feedback.”

As per Drucker’s view, “Corporate planning is not confined to taking strategic decisions in the light of future conditions but is also concerned with the implementation of these decisions in the best possible way and undertaking periodic review of these decisions in the light of new development.”

Corporate planning is quite comprehensive as it includes – (i) strategic planning, (ii) operational planning and (iii) project planning.

Corporate Planning – Top 6 Characteristics  

1. Corporate planning is a formal and systematic process.

2. It is a rational process. It requires imagination, foresight, reflective thinking, judgement and other mental facilities.

3. Corporate planning is a continuous process. It is a dynamic exercise that goes on throughout the company’s life.

4. Corporate planning has a long-term perspective.

5. Corporate planning provides an integrated framework within which each of the functional and departmental plans are tied together.

6. Corporate planning is basically concerned with the future impact of present decisions.

Corporate Planning – Scope

A corporation can be effective only if it can grapple successfully with the external environment (that is the society) in which it functions. Similarly, the corporation can function smoothly and efficiently only if it can deploy its material, manpower and methods in a way that they function with optimal efficiency.

Hence to be effective and efficient the corporation has to cope with external as well as internal environment. Hence corporate planning has two aspects, macro and micro; the former is concerned with the interaction with the external environment and the latter with the interaction with the internal environment. The scope of corporate planning in its macro (aggregative) and micro (functional) aspects has been discussed below-

Scope of Corporate Planning:

1. Aggregative (Macro) Aspects:

i. Economic- National Economic Projections — Technological Progress.

ii. Political- Policy towards private investment.

iii. Social- Social mores and attitudes towards pricing and income distribution.

iv. Regulatory- Government controls on imports and investment, repatriations and size of firms.

v. Competition- Relative growth rate of firms, future tax trends, government policy towards large-scale enterprise.

The need for and extent of corporate planning within any economy is governed basically by the factors.

Scope of Macro-Aspect of Corporate Planning:

1. Economic:

i. National Planning:

a. G.N.P. growth forecasts.

b. Inter sectoral plans.

c. Role of public and private sectors.

d. Monetary and fiscal policy.

e. Export prospects and balance of payments trends.

f. Credit policy.

g. Changes in price level.

ii. Demand:

a. Price policy.

b. Population growth rate.

c. Income-saving pattern.

d. Rate of urbanisation.

iii. Technological Planning:

a. State of indigenous technology.

b. Foreign collaboration and import of technology,

c. Facilities for research and development work.

iv. Availability of Resources:

a. Materials.

b. Manpower

c. Methods.

v. Infrastructure Facilities:

a. Transport.

c. Equivalent.

e. Finance.

2. Political:

i. Manifestoes of party in power and in opposition.

ii. Attitudes towards nationalization and the growth of public sector.

iii. Attitudes towards investors.

iv. Attitudes towards workers.

v. Interests of different pressure groups and lobbying.

vi. Donations to political parties.

i. Policies towards income distribution.

ii. Policies towards “Social pricing”.

iii. Attitudes towards consumption and savings.

iv. Attitude towards social responsibility of business.

v. Attitude towards environmental pollution.

4. Regulatory:

Government Regulations-

i. Industrial licensing.

ii. Foreign exchange.

iii. Capital and bonus issues.

iv. Competition policy.

v. Repatriation of capital/dividends.

vi. Tariff Commission.

5. Competitive:

i. Relative, growth rate of firms.

ii. Government policy towards large business houses.

iii. Tax policies.

iv. Competition for market and market structure.

v. Competition for control of scarce resources like materials, managerial manpower and finance.

vi. Competition from public and cooperative sectors

From the above discussion it is obvious that data on wide variety of topics and aspects has to be collected for coping with the external environment. This process of scanning the external environment is usually denoted by the term “monitoring of the environment”.

There is of course substantial inter-dependency among these various aspects, namely, economic, political, social regulatory and competitive. However, for a moment we may ignore this interdependency and consider the need for and scale of planning which are positive functions of all these factors.

The intensity of impact of each one of these factors varies from country-to-country, from industry-to-industry, from sector-to-sector, from unit-to-unit and, from time-to-time for the same unit. Hence, there is a real need to monitor the environment regularly and continuously.

In particular, one may note the distinctive differences in the developed and developing economics in this respect. In the developed economics, there is stiff competition for a share of the market and relatively less competition for resources. Whereas in developing countries there is not much likelihood of customer based competition.

Instead there is a stiff competition for claims on resources, especially materials, managerial manpower and finance. Further, in developed countries the corporations are giant-sized while government regulation is minimal. On the contrary, in developing countries the corporations are relatively smaller in size but government control and regulations are relatively large and oppressive.

2. Functional (Micro) Aspects:

i. Marketing- New products, new markets, etc.

ii. Production- Technical problems, research.

iii. Materials- Quality, availability.

iv. Finance- Capital structure, sources, viability.

v. Manpower- Managerial, labour force projections, and development.

In addition it is necessary to note that the size of the corporation, the business in which it is engaged and the goals that it has set for itself are crucial factors which affect its planning whether macro or micro.

The second aspect of corporate planning is the “micro” to functional aspect. In broad terms the functional aspects of corporate planning embrace marketing, production and materials procurement, finance and personnel and manpower planning?

Corporate Planning – Major Practices

1. Definition of Corporate Goals:

Planning is a goal-oriented process. Hence, unless the goals are defined planning becomes impossible. Thus, the definition of corporate goals becomes the necessary and essential first step in corporate planning.

Since survival and growth are universally recognised as the basic goals of an organisation, they constitute the basic goals of a corporation as well, as corporation is essentially a social organisation. However, a corporation has multiple goals as objectives need to be identified in every single area in which the quality and effectiveness of performance of a corporation, directly and vitally affects its chances of survival and growth.

Peter F. Drucker has identified eight such key areas as follows:

i. Market standing

ii. Innovation

iii. Productivity

iv. Resources physical, financial and technological

v. Profitability

vi. Managerial performance and development

vii. Workers’ performance and attitude

viii. Public responsibility

2. Forecasting Change in Environment:

The effectiveness and efficiency of a corporation depends to a large extent on its ability to cope with the changing environment both macro and micro. Since the corporation has to survive and grow in a dynamic and ever changing society it is essential to look ahead and forecast the probable changes.

If the changes foreseen represent opportunities for the corporation, then the corporation can, through advance planning, seize the opportunity and exploit it to the maximum advantage of the company. On the contrary if unfavourable changes in environment are foreseen defensive action may be planned to minimise losses or disadvantages. Thus, whatever the nature of change if it is foreseen, the corporation can plan to benefit by this fore-knowledge.

3. Overall View:

It is necessary to recognise that the goals and perspective of individual divisions and departments as also the view of any grouping of divisions or departments is not the same thing as the perspective or viewpoint of the corporation as an integrated whole. The corporate perspective and the corporate goal is distinctly different from the individual perspectives and goals of departments and divisions or from any aggregation of such goals and perspectives.

4. Influence of Environment:

Since a corporation has to grapple both with the external environment as well as internal environment, corporate planning has to take into account the whole environment both internal as well as external. Thus, corporate planning takes into account both micro and macro-environment. This is essential because the efficiency and effectiveness of a corporation depends wholly on its ability to adjust to the environment in which it has to function.

Corporate Planning – Process

Corporate planning is a continuous phenomenon. To be specific planning may be stated as a “thinking process, an organised foresight and the vision based on fact and experience.” Plan­ning is more important than the plan.

Corporate planning is a process, that is to say, it is an activity carried out in a sequence of steps taken in a certain order. Like any other complex process it consists of hundreds of steps, some of which may be so small as to advance the process only imperceptibly, while others may be so important that to omit them in describing the process would make the description unintelligible.

Plan is the culmination of a particular thought process. It is also important for the survival and growth of an organisation; but in the modern times, the corporation has to keep itself fully prepared in the competitive environment to meet every even­tuality or threat.

Hence, planning becomes an unending process which goes on even after the execution of a particular plan. In other words, the plan ends but planning continues. Those organisations which are not involved in the constant planning process will lag behind in the race in a competitive market.

Constant thinking process leads to clarity about what is to be done or how it is to be done. It will lead to developing knowledge about the futurity which gives rise to the development of vision. The vision so developed will help Mangers to adopt such alternative course of action through which the corporate goal could be achieved with efficiency.

To make corporate planning successful, it becomes necessary to involve people operating at different levels. Their involvement will benefit the organisation in two ways – (i) their commitment and support for plan formulation and execution and (ii) their suggestions for making corporate planning more relevant and result oriented.

Dilating further on the efficacy of employee’s participation in decision-making, it may be stated that most difficult decisions could be taken without any problem. Some of the difficult issues may be resolved through turnaround strategy or switch over from labour intensive to capital intensive technology causing of retrenchment of such employees. Such decisions have been take in the past by DCM, ITC and SAIL.

Dismissal is the last rest in every act of gross indiscipline. To save the organisation, not one but many may be dismissed after taking consensus into account.

If the action is based on objective consideration with conviction, hardest decisions could be taken. Hence it may either be the dismissal of an employee or rustication of students from the University, such hard decisions are taken in the interest of organisations.

In certain cases even the employee is the party to his retrenchment.

Corporate planning, as already pointed out, starts with the formulation of mission, long term objectives and goals. Their long term goals and objectives may be laid down in the context of environmental setting. Within the limits of macro and micro environments strengths and weaknesses of the organisation are fully analysed in the paradigm of long term objectives and goals.

B.W. Denning has also laid emphasis on Environmental Appraisal. Instruments identified by him are markets competition, technology, economy, government, taxation etc.

These environments create opportunities and threats for different organisations existing in the country. In the light of the opportunities and threats an analysis of organisation’s strengths and weaknesses are ascertained which are necessary to achieve corporate goals. Estimation of corporate resources especially financial is an important condition for strategic planning.

Avail­ability of material, machine and equipment are not sufficient; more important is the human resource. Hence, there is a need for the analysis of skill, capability and the competence profile of the employees of the organisation. Simultaneously key skills required for structural change in the organisation and functional processes ought to be identified and defined.

Study of long term objectives and goals will be incomplete without establishing a linkage between the long term objectives and goals and the operating/short term plans.

While discussing corporate planning, it becomes essential to state the status of tactical plan­ning. Tactical planning is not a strategic or corporate plan. Corporate planning has two important elements – (i) Long term objectives and goals and (ii) structural changes in the organisational structure. Tactical planning does not fulfil any of these two conditions. It may be stated as the short term tactics to help realise the long term objectives and goals of the corporation.

The corporation is importing the machine and selling it in the market. Its long term objective is to manufacture every component and assemble them into a machine to sell in the market. One of the weaknesses of the corporation is that it does not have the needed skill and competence.

The corporation prepares a tactical plan. Under this plan, it makes the supplier agree to train its people for the sake of assembling the components and parts in the importing country. The know-how so obtained by the corporation’s people will be instrumental in realising the long term objective of producing the machine itself. This is tactical planning.

Next step in the process of strategic planning is development of strategic alternatives. These alternatives have been identified as (i) Expansion (ii) Diversification (iii) Integration (iv) Acqui­sition and Merger (v) Divestment and (vi) Liquidation.

Each of these alternatives has to be evaluated to find out its efficiency to achieve the desired organisational objectives and goals. The alternatives so selected will be implemented. The performance of the alternative course of action will be evaluated periodically which will provide the desired feedback to consider if some changes are necessary in the objectives and goals put forth by the organisation. As the long term objectives/goals are not generally changed casually, the feedback may be helpful in bringing about changes in the operational plans or even tactical plans.

Corporate Planning – 5 Major Steps

There are five major steps in corporate planning:

Step # 1. Environmental Scanning :

(a) External Environment:

Business environment is scanned to secure up-to-date information on opportunities and threats revealed by the changing environmental forces, such as customers, customer needs, competition, economic, social and political climate, ecology, and technology. The situation analysis indicates where we are, how we got here and where we are now going.

(b) Internal Environment:

Marketers must also have adequate knowledge of internal situation through self-analysis, i.e., on corporate strength and weakness. The corporate resources are the limitations on exploitation of marketing opportunities knocking at our door. The environmental opportunities may not become specific corporate opportunities.

Company opportunities constitute a set of marketing undertakings in which a particular company has competence and capability to enjoy the competitive benefit because of its particular and unique market approach. There should be a happy marriage between the company resources and company opportunities so that the marketer can accomplish the set corporate goals.

The internal and external environmental scanning offer us SWOT, i.e., Strengths and Weaknesses as well as Opportunities and Threats. Threats are considered as challenges to be met or overcome by strategic planning. Marketing information and research enables us to scan external environment. Sales audit and cost analysis enable us to study internal environment.

Step # 2. Defining Corporate Mission :

The statement of basic purpose or mission offers customer-oriented answers to a few questions, e.g., what is our business? Who is our customer? What is our goal? The mission focuses the attention on the fundamental customer needs.

Examples of Mission- What is our business?

i. Communication Co. We offer varied forms of reliable, efficient, cost-effective services in telecommunications.

ii. Xerox- We automate offices.

iii. Levi Strauss- In wearing garments we offer fashion, comfort and durability.

iv. Cosmetic Co. In the shops we sell hope.

Step # 3. Setting Objectives :

The mission answers the question, “What is our business?” The objectives answer the question, “What do we want to achieve?” Objectives must be clear, ambitious but realistic, measurable and time-bound. The mission points out the needs to be served. The objectives indicate performance standards, e.g., market share, profit, services, customer satisfaction, etc. Please note that objectives or goals are the desired or planned outcome.

Step # 4. Identifying Strategic Business Unit (SBU) :

Within a multi-product or multi-business corporation, we may have one or more business areas or SBU. In the corporation there may be more than six divisions but in reality we may have only three distinct businesses. Hence, for strategic planning, all divisions will be grouped into only three strategic business units.

The concept of SBU has unique importance in corporate strategic planning. The products that form a planning unit (SBU) should have, in common, major strategic features such as target markets, distribution channels/advertising, and sales force strategies. Thus, SBU is a separate division for a major product or a product line or a market in a multi-product or a multi-business organisation.

It is in charge of conducting situation analysis, determining marketing objectives, selecting target market, measuring the market and designing a strategic marketing-mix.

In order to identify SBU, a business is defined on the basis of consumer-orientation (not product-orientation) in terms of three dimensions- (1) Customer needs to be met, (2) Group of customers to be served, and (3) Product or service to fulfil those needs.

The SBU has three features- (1) It is a collection of related products meeting similar needs, (2) The unit has its own rivals and it wants to surpass them through best marketing strategies, (3) The manager of SBU organisation is directly responsible for strategic marketing planning, control and profits.

Each SBU manager is given a set of strategic planning goals and the requisite finance. The manager will present SBU marketing strategic plan to the corporation which will give its sanction with a few modifications, if essential. The manager of SBU will formulate a distinctive plan of marketing objectives and strategies, distinctive marketing-mix for the target market, i.e., chosen market segment. Each SBU will have its own distinct mission, competition and strategy.

The concept of SBU provides precise and practical direction to the process of corporate strategic planning. In India, SBU concept is adopted by big businesses in corporate strategic planning.

Step # 5. Selecting Appropriate Strategies :

Once the corporation has planned where it wants to go, the next step is to answer the question “How are we going to get there”? Corporate strategies supply the best answer to this vital question, viz., the best means to achieve the desirable goals and fulfill the mission.

There are four alternative strategies before the corporation or an SBU:

1. Invest Strategy- Marketing efforts are intensified further to strengthen the SBU or the enterprise.

2. Protect Strategy- The SBU will be given help to maintain its present position in the market.

3. Harvest Strategy- The SBU is used as a cash-flow source to help other SBUs to grow or maintain the position.

4. Divest Strategy- The sick or unwanted SBU may be just sold out and the corporation gets rid of that SBU.

Please note that the strategic company planning is done by the top management for the whole enterprise. Strategic marketing planning is done at the strategic business unit level. The annual marketing planning is done for each product line, major product or market.

Corporate Planning – Difference between Strategic Planning and Corporate Planning

Strategic Planning:

1. Nature – Strategic planning is devised to meet changes and challenges in the environment.

2. Purpose – It addresses contingencies.

3. Coverage – It may relate to a particular functional area.

4. Scope – It is a part of corporate planning

Corporate Planning:

1. Nature – Though corporate planning is environment based, it is developmental in outlook.

2. Purpose – It addresses all types of contingencies (both predictable and unpredictable).

3. Coverage – It is meant for organization as a whole.

4. Scope – It includes both strategic planning and operational planning.

Corporate Planning – 27 Main Reasons which Lead to the Failure of Corporate Planning

Steiner and Hussey have identified a check list of twenty seven reasons which lead to the failure of corporate planning:

1. Failure to develop throughout the company an understanding of what strategic plan­ning really, is, how it is to be done in the company and the degree of commitment of top management to doing it well.

2. Failure to accept and balance inter-relationship among institutions, judgement, managerial values and formality of the planning system.

3. Failure to encourage managers to do effective strategic planning by basing performance appraisal and rewards solely on short range performance measures.

4. Failures to tailor and design the strategic planning system to the unique characteristics of the company and its management.

5. Top management, becomes so engrossed in current problems that it spends insufficient time on the strategic planning process and the process becomes discredited among other managers and staff.

6. Failure to mesh properly the process of management and strategic planning, from the highest levels of management and planning through tactical planning and its complete implementation.

7. Failure to modify the strategic planning system as conditions within the company change.

8. Failure to keep the planning system simple and to weigh constantly the cost/benefit balance.

9. Confusing the extrapolation of financial and/or economic projections with strategic planning.

10. Management’s failure to understand the analytical tools used in different parts of the planning process and theory becoming captive to staff experts.

11. Failure to secure in the company the climate for strategic planning that is necessary for its success.

12. Failure to balance and link appropriately the major elements of the strategic planning and implementation process.

13. Failure by managers to understand the importance of implementation of strategy and how to make that process efficient and effective.

14. Blame strategic planning for failure in other managerial and staff procedure.

15. Chief executive does not believe it, but has a planner because other firms also have such a person.

16. Insufficient backing by chief executive leads line managers to under-estimate its importance.

17. Chief executive instructs planner to avoid upsetting line managers, as they are too busy with current activities.

18. Chief executive gives planner too low a status that he is unable to converse with general managers on equal terms.

19. Chief executive creates a planning committee rather than give planning task to one individual.

20. Chief Manager allows some managers to opt out of the system.

21. Chief executive spends too little time on planning.

22. Corporate planner tries to do all planning himself.

23. Planner of low calibre.

24. Planner has only a part time interest in planning and has to spend much of his time on other activities.

25. Planner is a narrow specialist who lacks ability to seek full scope of his trade and view planning only in terms of his own discipline.

26. Lack of attention to one or more of the basic steps.

27. Company tries to move into an advanced management area before it is ready e.g. companies with no accounting function.

Corporate planning may achieve the desired organisational goals if a soft approach is fol­lowed in corporate planning. Short range and medium range plans should constitute the sub­systems of the corporate plan system. The corporate planning process should be initiated with the proper evaluation of each alternative with the technique of SWOT analysis. The selected alterna­tive should also be evaluated periodically with a view to reduce the gap between planning and performance to be minimum.

The success of corporate planning will depend on the willingness of people to implement the plan on the one hand and the practicability of the plan on the other. Both these parameters of a rationally effective plan are available in the involvement of people in the formulation of the plan.

Only people who are in the field are the best judges regarding the applicability of the plan. If they are not involved, the plan will be unrealistic and likely to fail on the anvil of organisational goals and objectives.

Corporate Planning – Limitations

(1) Excessive Bureaucratisation:

The formalised process becomes bureaucratic. The bureau­cratic burden strifes creativity and overshadows the prime object of organisational effectiveness. The ills of bureaucratisation may be avoided by a comprehensive and extensive strategic audit. The audit may be a long term —say every five yearly; during the interim period the company may resort to minor upgrading of strategies and programmes.

Further, the corporation may select only articulate units for careful attention because of environmental changes. Such discriminatory approach is intended to avoid environmental effects.

The other device to avoid bureaucratisation is to select every year a planning theme which may require attention of all key managers. Gluck, Stephen, Kaufman, and Wallock have given illustrative suggestions by way of new manufacturing process technologies, the value of the firm’s product to customers and alternative channels of distribution.

(2) Lack of Integration with Other Formal Management Systems:

Corporate Planning is not an isolated activity; it is the part of the organisational system. The organisation is a system whole and different departments and groups are the sub-systems. Hence the activities of the plan for­mulation and plan execution have to co-exist to achieve the desired goals.

Three factors may be responsible for this type of situation – (i) Corporate plan has been formulated in an autocratic manner with the result that the managers in-charge of execution may not be expected to extend support or commitment for execution; (ii) the plan is not realistic because it may not be based on the environmental realities existing within and without the organisation; and (iii) adequate prepa­ration may not have been made to execute the plan with conviction.

In short, if the organisation does not follow the systems approach both in letter and spirit, the organisation will be confronted with the problem in the execution of the plan.

(3) Greater Reliance on Tactical Planning:

More often the corporation is swayed by unex­pected emergencies of opportunities and threats which relegate strategies to the background. Since tactical planning usually concentrates on a segment of the corporation, the holistic concept gets diluted which lands the corporation far away from strategic planning.

Further, tactical plan­ning is based on the existing capabilities that permit slackness and flexibility. The pressure of tactical planning more often blocks the paradigm of corporate planning.

This problem could be averted by establishing fusion between the two planning processes. These limitations could be averted by taking two steps – (i) By designing and implementing an effective control system capable of bridging the gap between planning and performance and (ii) forging integration between strategic and operational modules.

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10 Straightforward Steps to the Corporate Budget Planning Process 

Today, the corporate budget planning process is vital for Finance.  Through this structured approach, organizations allocate resources, forecast financial outcomes and plan for future financial performance.  Those key uses underscore why the process is so crucial to effective strategic management.   

Corporate Budget Planning 

In essence, corporate budget planning enables businesses to align their spending and investment with their goals, priorities and market conditions. 

The process typically involves 10 key but straightforward steps. 

1.  Define Objectives and Strategy 

Defining objectives and strategy for corporate budget planning involves setting clear, actionable goals that align with the organization’s broader strategic vision.  These objectives, in turn, serve as benchmarks for what the company aims to achieve financially within a specific time period.  What aims?  A few examples include increasing revenue by a certain percentage, reducing operational costs, expanding into new markets or enhancing capital investment returns. 

At the same time, effective objectives are both ambitious and realistic.  They provide a focused direction for financial planning and decision-making.  Accordingly, the objectives should be developed through a collaborative process that involves input from key stakeholders across the organization.  Such input ensures alignment with overall business goals and accounts for the company’s operational capabilities, market conditions and competitive landscape. 

The strategy for achieving these objectives is the roadmap that outlines how the organization will allocate resources to meet its financial goals.  What’s involved in that strategy?  Key elements are detailed planning on revenue generation tactics, cost management initiatives, investment in growth opportunities and risk mitigation measures. 

This strategic planning requires a deep understanding of the business environment, including customer demand, economic trends and regulatory changes.  That understanding allows for making informed decisions on spending, saving and investing.  But whatever the strategy, it should be flexible enough to allow for adjustments in response to unforeseen challenges or opportunities. 

Ultimately, the combination of well-defined objectives and a robust strategy enables a company to efficiently execute its corporate budget planning.  And that matters because it ensures financial stability and supports long-term organizational growth. 

2.  Review Past Performance 

Reviewing past performance is an essential phase in the corporate budget planning process.   

That review acts as a mirror to reflect the organization’s financial health and operational efficiency over previous periods.  Thus, this retrospective analysis involves a comprehensive examination of financial statements (e.g., income statements, balance sheets and cash flow statements) alongside operational metrics. 

The goal?  To identify patterns, trends and anomalies that can inform future budgeting decisions.  By understanding where the company has had financial success and faced challenges, leadership can make more informed predictions and decisions for the future. (We believe that Finance teams using AI and Sensible ML to identify patterns, trends and anomalies are the ones getting the farthest ahead.) 

Yet this review process goes beyond merely looking at numbers.  Instead, it requires a deep dive into the reasons behind those numbers.  If the company experienced a significant variance in actual revenues compared to budgeted revenues in a recent FP&A report , for example, knowing the why behind that variance is vital.  Was it due to changing market conditions, a new competitor entering the market or perhaps internal factors such as production issues? 

Similarly, analyzing expenditure trends helps identify areas of inefficiency or overspending.  This analysis can involve examining costs line by line to see where the budget was exceeded and why.  Through that process, companies can identify opportunities for cost savings or process improvements. 

Reviewing past performance, however, is not just about identifying what went wrong.  The process also helps organizations recognize what went right.  Why does that matter?  Well, success in certain areas – such as a particularly effective marketing campaign or a cost-saving initiative – provide valuable lessons.  Those lessons can then be replicated and built upon in future periods. 

This phase of the budget planning process also encourages a culture of accountability and continuous improvement within the organization.  Essentially, by closely examining past performance, departments and teams can: 

• Set more realistic goals 
• Better align strategies with corporate objectives 
• Adjust plans based on what has been proven to work or not work in the past 

Ultimately, in the corporate budget planning process, reviewing past performance is a critical step.  It lays the groundwork for more accurate and effective budget planning.  In fact, this step ensures the budgeting process is grounded in reality – one where strategies and objectives are informed by empirical data and historical context.  This grounding helps organizations not only set more achievable financial targets but also devise strategic initiatives more likely to drive the organization toward its long-term goals. 

3.  Revenue Forecasting 

Revenue forecasting allows a company to estimate its future sales and income over a specified period.  What so crucial about this projection?  It helps with setting financial targets, making informed decisions about expenditures and planning for growth. 

Typically, revenue forecasts are based on a combination of historical sales data, market analysis and an assessment of external factors that could influence demand.  Those factors can include economic trends, industry developments and competitive dynamics.  By analyzing these elements, companies aim to predict their financial inflow with a reasonable degree of accuracy.  And they do it while adjusting for seasonality, market shifts and other variables that might impact revenue. 

Effective revenue forecasting requires a meticulous approach – one that blends quantitative analysis with qualitative insights.  Companies often use models that incorporate past performance trends while adjusting for future market expectations and strategic initiatives, such as product launches or expansions. 

Whatever the model, the forecasting process is inherently iterative, with forecasts regularly updated to reflect new information or changes in the business environment.  This dynamic approach allows companies to remain agile.  How?  It empowers companies to make strategic adjustments to operations, marketing and budget allocations in response to evolving forecasts. 

Ultimately, accurate revenue forecasting is essential for strategic planning, resource allocation and financial management.  Businesses can use the forecasts to set realistic goals and measure progress toward achieving them. 

4.  Cost and Expense Estimation 

Cost and expense estimation is essential for creating a realistic and effective corporate budget plan.  Why, exactly?  Such estimations help businesses anticipate financial outflows and manage resources efficiently.  For any cost estimation, both fixed and variable costs matter.  Salaries, rent and utilities are examples of fixed costs – which, by nature, do not change with the level of goods or services produced.  Meanwhile, materials, shipping and commissions are example variable costs, which inherently fluctuate with business activity levels. 

The accuracy of cost and expense estimation greatly impacts the ability to maintain profitability and cash flow.  To estimate costs effectively, companies analyze historical spending trends to forecast future expenses.  This analysis is supplemented with information about planned initiatives, expansion efforts or any operational strategy changes that could affect costs.  For variable costs, companies also consider projected sales volumes, pricing strategies, supply chain dynamics and other factors that affect the cost of goods sold and operational expenses. 

In addition, effective cost and expense estimation requires a forward-looking approach that considers external factors.  Market trends, economic conditions and regulatory changes are just a few of such factors.  For instance, anticipated increases in raw material costs, changes in labor laws or fluctuations in currency exchange rates can all impact future expenses.  Such considerations enable businesses to develop more accurate and resilient budgets. 

But companies must also maintain a degree of flexibility in those budgets to accommodate unexpected costs.  This accommodation, in turn, ensures companies can respond to unforeseen challenges – without compromising financial stability. 

Overall, cost and expense estimations are not just about predicting numbers.  This step is also about understanding the financial implications of a company’s operational and strategic decisions.  By carefully analyzing both internal and external factors that influence costs, businesses can create budgets that support their goals while effectively managing risk.  This process requires the following: 

• Collaboration across departments 
• Clear communication of financial goals and constraints 
• Regular review and adjustment of estimates to reflect new information or changing conditions 

Ultimately, through diligent cost and expense estimation, companies lay the groundwork for financial health, strategic growth, and long-term success in corporate budget planning. 

5.  Capital Budgeting 

Capital budgeting in corporate budget planning is a strategic process that helps companies evaluate and prioritize investments in long-term assets and projects.  How?  Assessments look at potential expenditures on assets (e.g., new machinery, property, technology upgrades or expansion projects), which require substantial upfront investment but generate returns over several years.  Accordingly, the capital budgeting process helps determine which projects align with strategic objectives and offer the best potential for financial return. 

Capital budgeting employs various analytical techniques, such as net present value (NPV), internal rate of return (IRR) and payback period calculations.  Using these techniques, companies evaluate the profitability and risk of investment proposals.  This meticulous evaluation, in turn, helps ensure a company allocates its limited resources to the projects most likely to enhance its competitive position and shareholder value over the long term. 

Yet capital budgeting is not merely about identifying and investing in profitable ventures.  It also involves strategic planning and risk management.  Thus, capital budgeting requires a forward-looking perspective that considers how investments might impact the company’s financial health and ability to respond to future market changes.  By carefully selecting projects that contribute to strategic goals (e.g., expanding market reach, improving efficiency or innovating product offerings), companies can sustain growth and adapt to evolving industry landscapes. 

Ultimately, this process demands cross-functional collaboration.  That collaboration involves input from various departments to ensure projects are feasible, strategically aligned and have a clear implementation plan.  Through effective capital budgeting, businesses position themselves to make informed decisions that drive long-term success and resilience. 

6.  Allocate Resources 

Allocating resources in corporate budget planning requires distributing financial assets among various departments, projects and initiatives to achieve strategic goals and operational efficiency.  Through this critical step, companies decide how much funding to allocate to different areas of the business.  Based on what?  The strategic importance, the expected return on investment and the alignment with the company’s overall objectives. 

Thus, allocating resources requires a delicate balance between supporting existing operations, investing in growth opportunities and maintaining financial health.  Effective resource allocation ensures that every dollar spent contributes to the company’s long-term success.  Whether through driving revenue growth, enhancing productivity or entering new markets, those contributions all matter to the company’s bottom line. 

Effective resource allocation demands thorough analysis and strategic thinking.  To get started, companies must clearly understand its priorities and objectives.  A detailed evaluation of the potential impact and costs tied to each budget request is also important.  Throughout the process, decision-makers must consider projected revenue, cost savings, market trends, competitive dynamics and other factors.  Yet the process isn’t static.  It requires continuous monitoring and adjustment in response to performance data and changing market conditions. 

Ultimately, companies must regularly review how resources are allocated and make data-driven adjustments.  By doing so, companies can invest in the right areas to support sustainable growth and adaptability.  This approach thus not only maximizes the return on investment but also strengthens the organization’s ability to navigate uncertainty and capitalize on emerging opportunities. 

7.  Prepare Budget Drafts 

Preparing budget drafts in corporate budget planning is a crucial phase.  Preliminary financial plans are developed in this step, reflecting the company’s strategic objectives, revenue forecasts, and resource allocation decisions.  This process involves compiling detailed estimates of expected income, expenditures and investments for the upcoming period, usually the next fiscal year. 

Drafting the budget requires a collaborative effort across various departments, ensuring each contributes its insights and requirements.  This collaborative approach ensures the budget aligns with both the strategic goals of the company and the operational needs of individual departments.  In essence, the draft budget serves as a working document – one that facilitates discussions and adjustments before being finalized. 

The draft incorporates all the key components of financial planning.  What are those components?  They include sales forecasts, cost estimates, planned capital expenditures and any other financial commitments.  By including these elements, the draft budget provides a comprehensive overview of the company’s financial strategy. 

The preparation of budget drafts is iterative, allowing for refinement and adjustment as more accurate or updated information becomes available.  That iteration, however, requires a balance between ambition and realism to ensure the budget is challenging but achievable. 

In this phase, Finance teams therefore play a pivotal role.  How?  They analyze data to ensure consistency across different parts of the organization and integrate strategic priorities into the financial planning process. This stage often involves scenario planning and sensitivity analysis to assess the impact of various assumptions and potential risks on the company’s financial performance. 

Ultimately, by carefully crafting these budget drafts, companies lay the groundwork for financial discipline, strategic alignment and operational efficiency.  The draft budget is therefore a critical tool for guiding decision-making, setting expectations, and providing a baseline against which actual performance can be measured and managed throughout the fiscal year. 

8.  Review and Approve 

In this phase, the draft budget developed through collaborative efforts across departments undergoes scrutiny by senior management and, often, the board of directors.  This step ensures the proposed budget aligns with the strategic goals of the organization, remains financially sound, and sets realistic revenue and expenditure targets. 

The review process involves a thorough examination of three aspects: 

• Assumptions made during the drafting phase 
• Validation of the financial forecasts 
• Assessment of the proposed resource allocations 

Through those aspects, the process offers an opportunity for key decision-makers to challenge and refine the budget.  Doing so ensures it supports strategic initiatives, addresses operational needs and effectively manages financial risks. 

Notably, this phase may involve several rounds of review and adjustment, with feedback provided to department heads and Finance teams.  Why?  To further refine the budget until it meets the organization’s strategic and financial objectives.  After satisfying the scrutiny of the review phase, the budget moves to the approval stage.  This formal endorsement, usually by the company’s top executives and the board of directors, signifies the budget is the official financial plan for the upcoming period. 

In other words, the approval process solidifies the organization’s commitment to the budget’s targets and allocations, setting the stage for implementation.  The approval also serves as a signal to the entire organization about the priorities and financial direction for the forthcoming period.  With that signal, the approval emphasizes accountability and the importance of adhering to the budget. 

Ultimately, the approved budget becomes the benchmark against which financial performance is measured, guiding decision-making and financial management throughout the fiscal year.  This process of review and approval is crucial for ensuring the budget reflects the collective wisdom and strategic intent of the organization’s leadership.  Thus, the process effectively balances ambition with realism and aligns resources with opportunities. 

9.  Implement the Budget 

Implementing the budget in corporate budget planning marks the transition from planning to action.  In essence, the approved budget serves as a roadmap for the organization’s financial activities over the upcoming period.  This phase involves disseminating the budget details across departments, ensuring that managers and team leaders understand their financial targets and resource allocations. 

Implementation requires the following: 

• Setting up systems for monitoring expenditures and revenues 
• Establishing accountability mechanisms 
• Integrating the budget into daily operations and decision-making processes 

Effectively taking those actions during implementation ensures all parts of the organization work toward the common financial goals set out in the budget.  And everyone does it with a clear understanding of their roles in achieving the targets. 

Ultimately, implementing the budget is a continuous process that involves not just following the budget but also adapting to changes.  Successful adaptation requires ongoing communication and coordination across the organization to maintain alignment with the overall financial strategy. 

10.  Monitor and Review 

Monitoring and reviewing in corporate budget planning are an ongoing process that involves continuously tracking financial performance against the approved budget throughout the fiscal year.  Through this critical step, companies can ensure any deviations from the budget – whether in revenues, expenditures or other financial metrics – are quickly identified.  Doing so allows for timely adjustments to stay on track.  Collectively, the monitor and review process encompass the following: 

• Regular reporting on financial performance 
• Analysis of variances 
• Assessment of the budget’s effectiveness in supporting the organization’s strategic objectives  

Ultimately, the review component allows for reflection on what is driving any discrepancies between actual and budgeted figures.  Such reflection leads to insights that inform future budgeting cycles or immediate corrective actions.  Through the cyclical process of monitoring and review, companies can foster a culture of financial discipline, promotes accountability across departments.  That process thus enhances the organization’s ability to adapt to changing circumstances, thereby ensuring financial stability and strategic alignment. 

What’s Next for Corporate Budget Planning? 

Don’t forget to reflect on what you learn through every corporate budget planning cycle.   Insights gained from monitoring, reporting and adjusting the budget can feed into the next round.  In doing so, insights will help your company refine its planning approach and improve accuracy and effectiveness over time. 

Want a deep dive into budgeting, planning and forecasting?  Check out our free ebook ! 

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Liz Weston: Cost of making mistakes on DIY estate planning can be significant

• Updated: Mar. 31, 2024, 11:15 p.m. |
• Published: Mar. 31, 2024, 7:20 a.m.

Liz Weston, personal finance columnist

Dear Liz: I have a living trust.

I’ve also got family who have become estranged and priorities that have changed in terms of charities I’d like to benefit.

Is there any way to set up a trust that allows me to make these changes without having to pay an attorney?

Answer: There are certainly do-it-yourself options for estate planning. But if you can afford to pay for expert help, why wouldn’t you? Estate planning is complicated, and the cost of making a mistake can be significant. That’s especially true if there are disgruntled family members who could challenge your estate plan.

The good news is that updating a living trust typically costs a lot less than setting it up in the first place. As mentioned in previous columns, you should consider having an attorney review your trust about every five years, and after major life changes.

SS survivor benefits are only for spouses or dependents

Dear Liz: My mom passed away recently. She had a teacher’s pension as well as Social Security benefits. Am I eligible to receive part of her benefits? If so, what steps must I take?

Answer: Social Security survivor benefits are meant to help a deceased worker’s dependents. Dependents include spouses, minor children and disabled children, as long as the disability started before the child turned 22. If you qualify, contact Social Security at 800-772-1213.

Similarly, pension survivor benefits are typically limited to spouses and dependent children. You may be eligible for a one-time death benefit, if your mother named you as her beneficiary. Contact the pension administrator for details.

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Liz Weston, Certified Financial Planner, is a personal finance columnist for NerdWallet. Questions may be sent to her at 3940 Laurel Canyon, No. 238, Studio City, CA 91604, or by using the “Contact” form at asklizweston.com.

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OpenAI has changed the governance structure of its venture capital fund that backs AI startups, so its high profile chief executive Sam Altman no longer owns or controls the fund, according to a filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC).

A couple started planning their winery wedding without a set budget. Here's how their $73,000 day came together, from a pricey venue to DIY decor.

• High-school sweethearts Julia and Mark Baugh got married on September 3, 2023.
• Julia broke down their  $73,405 wedding day for Business Insider.
• The venue cost  $41,000, and the couple DIYed some of their decor.

When Julia and Mark Baugh got engaged, they didn't know much about the cost of a wedding .

They were the first of their friends to get married , meaning they had no real idea of venue prices, how much a floral arch would cost, or what they could expect to pay a videographer.

Julia spoke to Business Insider about how their wedding came together, breaking down the cost of their day.

Julia and Mark Baugh have been together since they were teenagers.

Julia was best friends with Mark's cousin throughout her childhood, but she didn't meet her now-husband until they were teenagers, she told Business Insider.

They finally met when Mark took the duo to get ice cream when Julia was 16 and he was 17. Their connection was instant.

"We've been best friends and dating ever since," Julia said.

Today, the Baughs live in New Jersey, where Julia, now 24, works for a mortgage company, and Mark, 25, works for a health company. Julia also creates content on TikTok .

When they got engaged in 2021, the Baughs didn't know much about weddings.

Mark popped the question in 2021 when he and Julia were 23 and 22.

Julia told BI they were the first of their friends to get engaged , so they didn't know much about weddings as they started planning their day.

"I was never one of those people that was like, 'I can't wait to get married,'" Julia said. "I never really thought about it. So honestly, planning a wedding was kind of a shell shock for me because of how overwhelming and expensive it was."

They set the wedding for September 3, 2023, giving them ample planning time.

As they started planning, Julia and Mark weren't sure how much to budget for their wedding.

Julia and Mark are savers, but they weren't financially planning for their wedding when he popped the question.

"We were actually trying to buy a house when he proposed," Julia said. "So that was really what we were saving for, and then we were like, 'Crap, now we have to save for a wedding.'"

Because they knew so little about the cost of weddings, the Baughs didn't set a budget as they started looking at vendors. Instead, they decided to find a venue that fit their needs, planning to select affordable vendors to complement it.

They fell in love with a winery.

When Julia saw photos of the Renault Winery & Resort in Egg Harbor City, New Jersey, online, she was pretty certain she would get married there.

"When I first saw it, I was like, 'This is it.' But just to appease everyone else, I checked out other ones," Julia said. "But as soon as we got there, my husband and I were like, 'Yep, let's just book it. This is our dream venue.'"

The outdoor space at the property particularly appealed to Julia, as she thought the winery would be the perfect backdrop for their ceremony.

Julia also liked that the venue provided catering and bar services as part of its wedding package.

The venue booking included alcohol, catering, tableware, and linens for the event, so the Baughs didn't have to outsource those services. Julia didn't want to have to worry about additional vendors on the wedding day, so the all-inclusive nature of Renault Winery & Resort appealed to her. It even included the cost of the cake.

"I didn't really want to set up anything on our wedding day," Julia said. "I didn't want to have to worry about bringing alcohol. I didn't want to have to worry about finding caterers."

"I just wanted to be able to enjoy getting ready and not have to worry about setting up, so it made it really easy," she added.

The venue was the priciest aspect of the wedding for the Baughs, and their parents ended up paying for it.

"Our parents split the venue price, which was awesome because we weren't even expecting to have help," Julia said.

Venue cost: $41,000

Julia wanted to invest in florals for the wedding.

Julia decided to go with a garden party theme for the nuptials, which meant flowers would be essential to the decor.

She tapped Bespoke Floral & Event Design to create floral displays with white flowers and a plethora of greenery, choosing the colors based on how photos of the event would look down the road.

"I picked our flower colors because I thought it would always match our home decor," she said. "If I picked pink flowers or whatever color, I would not want to hang the photos if I changed my home decor."

The ceremony included a floral arch, as well as arrangements lining the aisle.

But the Baughs reused the flowers that made a statement at their ceremony to get the most bang for their buck.

In terms of their budget, the Baughs spent a large portion on flowers.

"Flowers were definitely a splurge," Julia said. "I wanted that to be the main focus of the whole day."

However, they were able to get the most out of their investment by reusing flowers throughout the day. For instance, the arch at the altar was repurposed to accent Julia and Mark's sweetheart table, as were several bouquets lining the aisle.

Florals: $12,000

The Baughs also rented furniture to add more seating for their guests.

The Baughs wanted to add more furniture to the venue, specifically a couch and chairs for guests to lounge on throughout the event. Julia said they were particularly useful during cocktail hour.

They chose white couches and chairs with gold accents, as well as a glass coffee table, from Vision Furniture Event Rentals , placing flowers near them so they fit with the event's aesthetic.

"They were just another place to hang out and sit down," she said. "We actually took photos in front of it, which was really fun."

Furniture rentals: $800

To make the day run smoothly, the couple hired a coordinator for the wedding.

The Baughs didn't hire a full wedding planner, as Julia planned much of the day. But they did hire Tutti Belle Events to help them in the final stretch of wedding planning and on the day of the event.

"I pretty much planned the whole thing, and then two months before, she took over and did everything, which was so helpful," Julia said. "I was having a nervous breakdown two months before because I was so nervous, so it worked out."

Looking back at the day, Julia told BI that hiring a day-of coordinator for the wedding was one of the best investments she made in the wedding.

"She did so many things I did not even think of that needed to be done," Julia said.

Coordinator: $2,000

The Baughs added DIY touches to their wedding, which saved them money and brought their vision to life.

For instance, Mark made their welcome sign and brought Julia's vision for the seating chart to life.

"I found two pictures of a seating chart that I wanted to combine," she told BI. "My husband's very handy. He loves doing projects, and he's done a ton of stuff around the house."

So when he offered to make the seating chart for the day using materials they already had at home — making it essentially free — Julia was thrilled. The white, arched board had shelving with seat assignments and small bud vases of flowers. A "find your seat" decal written in cursive completed the sign.

Mark used materials they already had for the welcome sign as well.

"We always say I'm the brains behind the operation, and he does everything," Julia said of herself and her husband.

Seating chart and welcome sign: $100

Julia also designed their menu cards.

Julia made the menu cards herself, working with a printer to bring them to life. She even added a wax seal to the top of them.

Menu cards: $50

The Baughs also added an ice cream cart to their day.

Churn House is a local New Jersey ice cream shop with a churn cart for mobile events that provides ice cream sandwiches.

The brand reached out to Julia about including one of its carts at her wedding after seeing some of her TikTok content.

"Everybody loved it," Julia said of the cart. "The ice cream sandwiches were gone."

"They were such a hit, especially because it was 95 degrees on the day of the wedding," she added.

Churn cart: $650

Julia and Mark's wedding was documented in several ways.

Julia wanted "bright, airy photos" for the wedding, and Amber Dawn Photography was the perfect fit for her vision.

"She was so friendly," Julia said of Amber. "She took the best photos. When we got them back, I was like, 'I could not even imagine them looking this good.'"

Photographer: $5,200

They also hired a videographer.

The Baughs struggled to find a videographer, as many of them were out of their price range.

But then they found Forever Filmworks , which was perfect for their needs.

"I'm so glad we did it because we have the audio," Julia said. "We have the vows. We have all the speeches."

Videographer: $1,900

The Baughs had a content coordinator to document candid moments from the day, too.

In recent years, couples have started hiring people to create content for their weddings, capturing shorter and more behind-the-scenes moments than traditional photographers or videographers often do.

The Baughs tapped Salt Air Socials for the job, so their wedding was covered from as many angles as possible.

Content creator: $475

Music played a big role in the couple's wedding.

The Baughs had live music at their ceremony, hiring Ceremonious Strings for $650 to accompany them.

But their reception had more of a party feel thanks to DJ Treble & Bass Productions , whose services cost $3,000.

Music: $3,650

Julia's wedding dress was a gift, but she paid for her hair and makeup for the nuptials.

Julia's mother bought her a $4,000 Badgley Mischka Bride wedding dress and a $400 veil.

But Julia paid for her hair and makeup herself. Prostyled Bride styled her hair, which cost $250, and her makeup services were provided by Makeup By Brielle for $350.

Mark chose to rent a tuxedo for the wedding, which cost $180.

Dress and veil: $4,400

Hair and makeup: $600

Groom's attire: $180

Julia and Mark hired an officiant, but they said private vows, too.

Mark DeMuro officiated their wedding. Julia told BI he "wrote something cute" for them to say during the ceremony.

But they exchanged more personal vows privately during their first look ahead of the ceremony.

"We are both very shy, so we were very nervous to say vows in front of everyone," Julia said. "So it was really sweet to do it by ourselves."

Officiant: $400

In total, the couple's wedding cost over $73,000.

Though Julia and Mark's parents helped cover some of the costs, the couple still spent $28,000 of their own money on the wedding.

Julia thinks it's important for couples to know the real cost of weddings before they get engaged, which is why she's been open about her budget breakdown on TikTok .

"I feel like a lot of people don't really understand how much of an investment a wedding is," she said. "If you're going to have a big wedding with 150 people, it's going to be a lot of money, and you have to figure out whether that's worth spending the money for you."

"Once you sign those contracts, you can't get out of it," Julia said. "You'll lose a ton of money. So, I think that's my biggest advice for couples. Really just figure out what you want."

"Don't let social media or family members or anything pressure you into doing something because you feel obligated to," she added.

Total: $73,405

Dress: $4,000

Groom's tuxedo: $180

Six months into their marriage, Julia and Mark are closer than ever.

"That's my best friend," Julia said of her husband. "If I don't want to hang out with anybody, we can sit on the sofa together in silence and still just enjoy each other's company."

"He's always been my best friend," she added.

If you want to share the real cost of your wedding with Business Insider for a story, get in touch at  [email protected] .

• Main content

Many GOP billionaires balked at Jan. 6. They’re coming back to Trump.

Elite donors are rediscovering their affinity for the former president over taxes — even as he vows to free jan. 6 defendants, promises mass deportations and faces 88 felony charges.

The day after a pro-Trump mob stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6 , 2021, billionaire and GOP megadonor Nelson Peltz called the insurrection a “disgrace” and expressed remorse for voting for Donald Trump . “I’m sorry I did that,” Peltz said of supporting Trump in 2020 .

But earlier this month, Peltz had breakfast with Trump and other billionaires — including hotelier Steve Wynn, Tesla and X CEO Elon Musk and former Marvel chairman Isaac Perlmutter — at Peltz’s luxurious oceanfront mansion in Palm Beach, Fla., according to people with knowledge of the meeting, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe the private gathering.

Peltz, a renowned activist investor currently in a battle over Disney, then told the Financial Times that he would “probably” vote for the GOP front-runner in 2024. The New York Times first reported that Trump dined with Musk and other donors but did not name Peltz, Wynn or Perlmutter.

As hopes of a Republican alternative have crumbled, elite donors who once balked at Trump’s fueling of the Capitol insurrection , worried about his legal problems and decried what they saw as his chaotic presidency are rediscovering their affinity for the former president — even as he praises and vows to free Jan. 6 defendants, promises mass deportations and faces 88 felony charges.

The shift reflects many conservative billionaires’ fears of President Biden’s tax agenda, which if approved would drastically reduce their fortunes. In some cases, it also points to their discomfort with the Biden administration’s foreign and domestic policy decisions. Some of these billionaires have been assiduously courted by Trump and his advisers in recent months.

“If it starts to look like Trump may win, despite his legal troubles, it is inevitable that Republican businesspeople who have not been fans will open their wallets in self-defense,” said Kathryn Wylde, CEO of the Partnership for New York City, the top lobbying group for major corporations in New York.

Democrats argue that these billionaires are making their personal fortunes their top priority. Biden has promised to raise many taxes on the rich, including the capital gains rate paid on investment income, and impose a new 25 percent tax specifically on billionaires. These efforts were stymied in his first administration, but the president would try again.

“The billionaire class is really threatened by Biden: These guys are about creating a dynasty of wealth for themselves, and hoarding it for their posterity, at the expense of everyone else in society,” said Steve Rosenthal, senior fellow at the Tax Policy Center, a nonpartisan think tank. “That’s the striking story at the moment.”

Some of these donors are not enthusiastic supporters of Trump — they wanted other candidates and still express misgivings about Trump and his ability to win a general election. “This isn’t a passionate embrace. It’s just reality,” one person close to major donors said. “No one is particularly excited about it.”

Trump’s team has used a soft touch with the billionaires and has shown more sophistication than some expected, according to a person with knowledge of the talks, who like others spoke on the condition of anonymity to reveal details of the interactions. At the center of some of the discussions has been top Trump aide Susie Wiles, who often comes armed with data and is viewed as “impressive and professional,” a person who heard her pitch said. Trump is also growing his fundraising team in Palm Beach, where Republican National Committee employees and others are expecting to move to raise money.

“She has given some of the donors a reason to feel better about it,” this person said. When one wealthy donor asked in a Palm Beach meeting whether Trump could win suburban and independent voters, she was prepared with slides and data, the person said.

And at Wiles’s suggestion, Trump has engaged in “call time,” dialing billionaires himself. In the past, he had been resistant to such measures.

Trump could desperately use the cash infusion as his campaign and the RNC trail Biden and the Democratic National Committee, and as he faces growing legal bills. Next month, he is planning a fundraiser hosted by a range of billionaires, including oil tycoon Harold Hamm, sugar magnate Jose “Pepe” Fanjul, real estate mogul Howard Lutnick, megadonors Rebekah and Bob Mercer, wealthy business executives Todd Ricketts and Warren Stephens and real estate magnate Steve Witkoff, according to an invitation reviewed by The Washington Post.

The price of admission is $250,000, but many donors are giving the maximum contribution of $814,600 — which will be split between Trump’s campaign and other entities, including the Republican National Committee and a leadership PAC that pays many of his legal bills. It is being hosted by John Paulson, a billionaire investor backing Trump. Giving $814,600 gets a seat at Trump’s table.

A Trump adviser said the event is expected to raise about $33 million. Trump advisers said that while they do not expect to have as much money as Biden’s campaign and the DNC, they believe they can close the gap.

“We are not only raising the necessary funds, but we are deploying strategic assets that will help send President Trump back to the White House and carry Republicans over the finish line,” said Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung.

Wynn has helped orchestrate some of the conversations. He and Trump talk regularly. But Trump in recent months has complained that Wynn has not given him a dollar even though they have been friends for years, according to people familiar with the remarks. Now, Wynn is headlining the fundraiser as well.

Blackstone CEO Steve Schwarzman, who rejected Trump in the 2024 GOP primaries, is now considering backing the former president, people familiar with the matter said. A top adviser to Schwarzman has spoken to multiple Trump advisers in recent weeks, according to the people familiar, but Schwarzman has not made a final decision on giving.

Oracle’s Larry Ellison — a billionaire who backed Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) and former U.N. ambassador Nikki Haley in the GOP primaries — is in discussions about writing a large check in support of Trump, people familiar with the matter said. Trump and his aides have courted Ellison in recent weeks. Richard Uihlein and Elizabeth Uihlein, conservative billionaires and heirs to the Schlitz brewing fortune, told the Financial Times that they will donate to Trump as well .

Spokesmen for Ellison and Schwarzman declined to comment or did not respond to a request for comment. A call to the law firm that represents Wynn also was not returned.

Perlmutter, a prominent presence at Mar-a-Lago, is working on an outside group to support the former president, according to people familiar with his activities.

There are some holdouts. Citadel CEO and billionaire Ken Griffin remains resistant to giving money to Trump and has told others he does not have plans to fall in line with Trump, according to people who have spoken to him. Billionaire investor Peter Thiel , at one time Trump’s biggest backer in Silicon Valley, still plans to stay out of politics this cycle and has rebuffed efforts from Trump’s team to garner support, said a person familiar with his thinking, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe his views.

Why Silicon Valley billionaires like Peter Thiel turned against Trump

In Silicon Valley, some members of an influential cohort of right-leaning tech investors and leaders who were alienated by Trump’s election-fraud crusade and the Jan. 6, 2021, attack appear to be coming around to him. Many have been put off by Biden’s campaigns against the wealthy, as well as his administration’s criticisms of the tech industry in particular, along with its efforts to regulate the artificial intelligence boom.

David Sacks, a prominent tech investor, former chief operating officer of PayPal and host of the popular “All-In” podcast, spent the bulk of last year giving support to candidates running against Trump. He partnered with Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) to launch his presidential campaign on Twitter last spring and later threw fundraisers for candidates Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Vivek Ramaswamy in the fall. Privately, he told associates that he was not a believer in Trump’s election fraud crusade and was searching for a more disciplined candidate.

But recently, Sacks has begun to noticeably praise Trump to his more than 800,000 followers on X. In one recent post, he referred to Trump as an “indispensable figure,” praising him for the “massive crowds he draws” and for going “over the heads of the media.” In another, Sacks wrote, “Keep ridiculing [Trump] if you want, I’m going to cut him some slack.”

A spokeswoman for Sacks, Jessica Hoffman, declined to comment on his views.

Joe Lonsdale, co-founder of data-mining firm Palantir and an associate of Sacks, Thiel and other billionaires on the right, was never a vocal Trump supporter. He backed DeSantis and threw a fundraiser for Ramaswamy. This week, Lonsdale told The Washington Post that he planned to vote for Trump because he preferred Trump’s policies to Biden’s. But he said he would not be a heavy donor to any candidate this cycle and that he would stay focused on advocating for policy changes at the state level.

Other business elites once alarmed by Trump’s illiberal tendencies have softened their criticisms. Gary Cohn — a top economic aide in Trump’s White House who quit in 2018 over issues including tariffs and the president’s response to the deadly white nationalist march in Charlottesville — recently sounded positive notes about the former president. A former Goldman Sachs executive who is now vice chair of IBM, Cohn told CBS News regarding the 2024 election : “I think the business community at this point is still open-minded. The business community wants to hear the policies.”

Some of the billionaires who have flipped were particularly outspoken in their criticism of Trump three years ago, at the height of public outcry over the Capitol riot. After Jan. 6, billionaire developer Robert Bigelow said Trump had “lost me as a supporter. … He showed that, in that particular hour, he was no commander.” Bigelow has pledged $20 million to a pro-Trump campaign group and has given $1 million to cover the former president’s legal costs, according to Reuters. Bigelow’s firm did not respond to a request for comment.

Hamm had expressed disapproval of Trump’s handling of Jan. 6 and said that the country needed a “clean slate.” Hamm started donating to Trump last year and is expected to continue to do so now. He often rants, according to people know him, about Biden’s energy and electric car policies, and he had a private meeting with Trump at Mar-a-Lago in recent months. Hamm is also headlining the fundraiser.

The arrival of the big-money cavalry comes at an auspicious time for Trump. He is on the hook for a $175 million bond in a New York civil fraud case, and the campaign has lagged behind Democrats in raising money.

The calculus on whether to support Trump is not always straightforward. One Trump fundraiser, speaking on the condition of anonymity to describe private conversations, said many GOP billionaire donors can face blowback from their family members for supporting the former president, along with employees and clients. This fundraiser also pointed out that it’s not clear to what extent GOP billionaires who backed other candidates in the primaries will have Trump’s ear if he is reelected, depending on the size of the check they cut.

But the financial upside of going with the former president may win out.

Trump has also discussed further cutting the corporate tax rate, and he toyed in his administration with unilaterally lowering the capital gains rate paid by investors.

“The Biden tax increase is really viewed with hostility by the people on Wall Street I talk to, even some of the more moderate Republicans on Wall Street who have typically not been conservative in their orientation,” said Stephen Moore, an outside economic adviser to Trump. “The higher rate on capital gains, the higher corporate rate — all that stuff is anathema to these people.”

An earlier version of this story wrongly said that a fundraiser involving Nelson Peltz was held at Donald Trump's Palm Beach mansion. The fundraiser was held at Peltz's Palm Beach mansion. The story has been updated.

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Key dates and events: From January to June, voters in all states and U.S. territories will pick their party’s nominee for president ahead of the summer conventions. Here are key dates and events on the 2024 election calendar .

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