Business Planning and Forecasting in the United States from a Business Economist’s Viewpoint

Abstract

At least three approaches to the subject of ‘corporate planning’ come to mind. One approach, a very narrow one, is to treat corporate planning as a mechanism for bringing some overall organisation and co-ordination to a dispersed decision-making apparatus—a framework for providing a needed degree of integration and co-ordination of actions which have been taken, or are to be taken, by what often are a large number of geographic and functional parts of the firm. This approach to planning usually focuses on the details of the apparatus. It is what economists would call an ‘institutional’ approach.

1 The views expressed herein are solely those of the author and should not be identified with his business affiliation.