Importance of Planning Ahead One of the most important lessons in life is to learn how to properly plan ahead for any situation that one may encounter; from daily life to planning your career one must learn how to properly plan. Short term planning must take place so that immediate goals are achieved. As Well, as long term planning so that larger more distant goals can be reached. Without proper planning many of life’s daily tasks would not be accomplished. Having a plan is a good start but one must also have a backup plan to ensure success.
However, following through is the most important part of any plan that is going to be successful. If these three basic ideas, that there needs to be a plan, there needs to be a backup plan, and finally that action needs to be taken for the successful completion one will have the means to successfully complete most any task. The planning of short term goals is what enables one to complete simple tasks, many of these tasks need to be completed on a daily basis. For example, before going to sleep at night you might ask yourself “What do I need to accomplish tomorrow? . This is the first step in your planning process, your setting those goals no matter how simple they may be. From getting up in the morning to going to sleep at night you have a plan. Some plans are easily made without a second thought. For instance setting your alarm to wake up the next morning would be an example of simple planning that only takes the smallest amount of thought. If the same plan for your daily life is made over and over it becomes routine.
Maybe you wake up the same time every morning, go to work the same way everyday, eat lunch at the same place same time everyday, make the same stops everyday on your way home from work. Eventually you don’t even realize that you’ve planned this into your day because it’s become a routine. Planning is a part of our daily lives it’s something we often do without even thinking about it. Long term planning is just as essential to one’s life as is the short term. If only short term plans are made it would be almost impossible to get larger more complex goals accomplished.
For more complex goals more effort is needed in planning. A long term plan is made up of several short term plans. If you pick out a large goal and just set out to accomplish it without a plan chances are you’re going to fall short. For example if you want to run a perfect PFT and you never make a plan on how you’re going to achieve it then chances are that goal will not be achieved. If you have no smaller goals to build up to the larger goal the task will become overwhelming and you’re more likely to give up. When you incorporate the smaller goals you are able to track your accomplishments.
That way you can see you’re making progress and become motivated to reach the next step in your plan instead of becoming overwhelmed and feeling that no matter what you do the goal is to far away to reach. However, if you fail to reach one of your smaller goals that has been set that does not mean achievement of your end goal is out of the question it just means that you need adapt your plan. All plans need flexibility built into them so that they can change and arise to the exact needs of the situation. Being flexible with your options is important in order to achieve your goals.
Everyone loves a plan that goes without any hitches. But the truth of the matter is that in some way or another, plans get derailed and adjustments must be made. As pessimistic as it sounds, it is a reality that we have to face. Some would disagree but statistics and probability will back me up on this. Opportunities, some usually unexpected, present themselves and must be taken for better results. Suffice to say, activities are never always implemented as they were planned. Plans provide us with the backbone of how we want things to be accomplished.
Our flexibility on the other hand provides us the chance to modify it as it is needed. We often take so much time to create the perfect plan but no matter how we try to calculate everything that may come in our way, there are some things that we just can’t quantify. At times we take so much time making up the best plan, trying to hone it over and over again that we lose our sight on the objective. General George S. Patton, a well respected officer of the US armed forces once said that “I would rather have a good plan today than a perfect plan two weeks from now. What is essential is our deep understanding of our goals. The wind may blow our boat in different ways but it is up to us to stir towards the right way no matter from where the wind blows. Knowing the objective and keeping our focus on it will help us maneuver around obstacles no matter how daunting it may be. The objective is always above the plan. Our flexibility and our openness will help us push forward closer to our goals if we truly commit ourselves to achieving it and not simply plan for it.
Making a plan and not taking action is a complete waste of time and effort. A plan in and of itself will accomplish nothing. Action planning is a process which will help you to focus your ideas and to decide what steps you need to take to achieve particular goals that you may have. It is a statement of what you want to achieve over a given period of time. Preparing an action plan is a good way to help you to reach your objectives in life: don’t worry about the future, start planning for it!
An effective action plan should give you a concrete timetable and set of clearly defined steps to help you to reach your objective, rather than aimlessly wondering what to do next. It helps you to focus your ideas and provides you with an answer to the question ‘‘What do I do to achieve my objective? ’’. It’s okay to have several objectives, but you will need to make a separate action plan for each, otherwise things get confused. No matter how much planning is done there are always setbacks and unexpected occurrences.
That is the reason that any well constructed plan also has a contingency plan. Not only one backup plan but several. Obviously it is impossible to plan for every single thing that could go wrong but an effort should be made to cover the biggest holes in a plan. We must plan for the short term and the long term to truly be successful. While doing this we must not forget that not everything is going to happen as planned. For these reasons we must keep a certain degree of flexibility in our plans. We must always improvise, overcome, and adapt when our plans fall through.
