Get ready for 2023 

 

What is Bottom-Up planning? 

 

To maintain harmonious and successful processes throughout your business, you need a plan that works for your company. Bottom-Up planning relies on a plan that originates from individual departments and is communicated up through the company into strategy at higher levels: integrating into organisational framework. This is a convergent approach, where every faction of the business has the ability to identify its own growth potential, and problem solve their own sticking points. This method of planning works on the hypothesis that by giving control to departments and acknowledging their perspective, you can generate more achievable, relevant targets and a more streamlined workflow. Taking the ideas from departments and transforming them into strategy within higher management can bring forth a unified, popular plan company wide.  

 

When is it most effective? 

 

Bottom-Up planning works well when based specific products or services of a company, sometimes specified to particular regions, and relies on sales forecast data. It also takes into account production capacity, department specific costs, and a subjective assessment of market trends by the planner. As it is a decentralised approach, companies with defined functional departments will benefit the most.  

 

What are the benefits? 

• Employee involvement: higher motivation and identification with plan 
• Employee involvement: employees feel more responsible for KPIs and objectives 
• More realistic plans 
• Higher target deployment rate 
• More likely to achieve desired results  
• Risk identification: feedback from those involved directly in projects 
• Broader knowledge base: harness the full power and potential of your team’s knowledge in specific fields 
• Improved collaboration: company wide communication, less isolation of departments 

 

What’s the catch? 

Bottom-Up planning requires a significant amount of time and coordination, especially when it is utilised for the first time. By paying close attention to narrower goals across your business, you may also find contradictory strategies. Without focused formation, the multiple strands of departmental plans can also lead to less developed organisational goals.  

 

Conclusion  

 

Each section of a company is its own ecosystem, with their own individual demands, knowledge, and considerations. By inviting them into the conversation, you can more fully understand the needs of your business, and integrate them into your strategic plan. Bottom-Up plans serve the entire company, rather than alienating, confusing, or overdemanding from divisions, but instead extracting the best of them. Your company will define its direction as a collective, empowering employees and management together. It makes sense to involve those with the most expertise in their fields in brainstorming and constructing new and improved processes, as this confidence and knowledge will trickle up your company.