継続的プランニングは、プランを継続的に更新し、年次または半期のプランから変更する方法です。プランは、内的または外的要因(優先順位の変化、特定のプログラムの予期せぬ遅延、 ビジネス環境の変化など)の発生により常時修正されます。
継続的プランニングは、変化する状況に適応でき、短期的で柔軟なプランニングを行うアジャイル開発とリーン開発の実装に強く関わっています。
多くのスタディマネジメントはチームレベルにのみフォーカスしていますが、継続的プランニングは、戦略、ポートフォリオ、製品レベルに至るまで、組織におけるあらゆるレベルで機能を発揮します。
Traditionally, planning is an exercise undertaken at specific moments in time (often annually or bi-annually) and that involves a top-down holistic effort to capture and lay down a map of where the company/product/project will go in the next 6 months or 1 year.
However, as the pace of change of the global economy increases, and new methodologies such as Agile and Lean that emphasise short planning cycles are adopted, this way of planning has become increasingly challenging to perform, with diminishing returns.
Specifically:
In view of this, it might seem simpler just to do away with plans altogether. However, companies do need an up-to-date view of their development and operations and the ability to project themselves into the future:
To answer these challenges, continuous planning proposes to replace the classic predefined and regular planning occasions with a continuous implementation of the planning in rapid parallel cycles. Planning is no longer triggered by a given date in the calendar, but by internal and external events as they occur.
As a result:
However, switching to continuous planning requires a massive change in mindset, at all levels of the organization. Specifically, all the people involved in one way or another in the planning process (which is most of any organization) need to shift the way they look at planning:
That being said, continuous planning is seldom (if ever) applied at all levels of the organization. Instead, companies will choose to apply it only to some levels (and most often at the team / operational level).
To support the implementation of continuous planning, organizations will need a system that is simple to use, in particular for
Two techniques are particularly used in conjunction with continuous planning: