The Concept of Planning Debt Explored

The costs of precision, neglect, and misalignment

Happy Tuesday, Transformation Friends. Another week, another opportunity to go Beyond the Status Quo.

This week, we’re going to play around with an idea that I had called Planning Debt.

Let’s take a step back for a moment to what inspired this idea: Technical debt. It's a concept I've been engaged with recently. It’s a term used in IT to describe the implied cost of future reworking caused by design or implementation constructs that make future changes in an IT system more costly or impossible. Technical debt can be created by things like poorly written software that generates future bugs, poorly written documentation that makes it hard for developers to understand and fix a system in the future, or aging IT that’s not up to today’s standards, to name a few examples.

Like its analogy to financial debt, technical debt isn't necessarily bad but it needs to be understood and managed. For example, a quick software prototype to test ideas is an example of good technical debt. It’s debt because a prototype requires future rework (that’s the point). Still, it might be considered good debt because it hedges against spending more time rewriting code that may need a more extensive overhaul (i.e. creating more technical debt). Even better, the prototype is built purposefully in a way that makes improving and scaling it easy.

This concept about the implied cost of future rework got me thinking about planning. Could a similar hidden future cost, a "debt," be caused by planning activities for projects and initiatives? I’ve certainly seen many instances where the way we plan creates additional work in the future.

So, this is how I started to think about Planning Debt.

Today we’ll look at what planning debt might mean and what I think are three main contributors: over-planning, under-planning, and misaligned planning.

So, grab your morning cup of coffee, and let’s get started

Defining Planning Debt

We’ll start with a simple definition inspired by the definitions of technical debt:

Planning Debt: Planning debt refers to the implied cost of future reworking and adjustment required due to factors such as inaccuracies, gaps, over-complexity, or oversimplification in a plan. It encapsulates the challenges and additional efforts needed to rectify or adapt the initial plan as a project or initiative progresses.

Whether stemming from excessive detail that hampers adaptability and delays delivery or insufficient foresight that leads to unexpected roadblocks, planning debt represents a hidden liability that can significantly affect an undertaking’s efficiency, cost, and success.

What contributes to planning dept? Let’s consider an analogy:

Imagine you’re planning a treasure-hunting expedition to an island you've never been to. From ancient maps, text, and tales passed down, you have fragmented knowledge about the island's location, its topography, some amount of gold as the potential treasure, and cryptic clues about its whereabouts. You weigh the potential costs and risks against the reward and decide to set out.

You now dive deeper into planning your trip. Perhaps you sketch out a rudimentary map, piecing together the landscape based on the information at hand. If you over-embellish your map with a detailed path based on your limited knowledge, you might find yourself at the end of an unexpected cliff. The time and effort spent retracing steps or finding alternative routes can be likened to the rework resulting from over-planning.

On the flip side, maybe you didn’t gather enough information before setting out. Your map is void of necessary landmarks or waypoints, making it hard to find your way once you’re on the island, and it might start you farther away from the treasure than you need to be. Your journey's added time and energy symbolize the rework resulting from under-planning.

Now imagine, just before you’re about to set out, you discover a translation error in your sources. Instead of gold, the island's true treasure is a medicinal herb cherished by its ancient inhabitants. The herb still has value (albeit less than the gold you were expecting) but requires special handling and storage to bring back successfully. Further, while you had anticipated cliffs based on the island's topography, requiring climbing gear that you brought along, you're faced instead with intricate networks of streams and rivers. An inflatable raft would have been the ideal tool. The unforeseen work of adjusting to the unexpected treasure and the time spent navigating these waterways underscore the repercussions of misaligned planning (i.e. not planning the right things).

I’d classify these three things as contributors to planning debt and intrinsic aspects of planning. As with technical or financial debt, they are not inherently bad, but it’s crucial to recognize and manage them appropriately. The concept of planning dept might allow us to balance planning against the uncertainties and risks associated with these contributors and quantify the impact in terms of future rework.

Exploring Three Contributors to Planning Debt

Let’s look more deeply at these three contributors.

1. Over-planning: The Precision Paradox

What is Over-planning?: Over-planning is characterized by detailing a plan to the extent that its intricacy and effort outweigh its utility and effectiveness. This can be done by exhaustive analysis and preparation, aiming to forecast and address every conceivable scenario, or by trying to “plan away” uncertainties that cannot be avoided.

How It Creates Planning Debt: Overplanning can create an environment of inflexibility, where the plan becomes so detailed that it becomes a constraint. This rigidity can make it challenging to adapt when circumstances change, leading to increased costs or inefficiencies as things veer off course. In addition, over-planning consumes time and resources that could have otherwise been used for actual delivery.

Example: Consider a government agency implementing a new social welfare scheme. An over-detailed plan may lock the project into specific pathways, leaving it vulnerable to unanticipated changes in economic conditions, societal needs, or technological advancements. Planning dept, in this case, could come in the form of the rework required to implement missed opportunities that a more flexible approach might have capitalized on.

2. Under-planning: The Neglect of Foresight

What is Under-planning?: Under-planning is characterized by inadequate detail and foresight. These deficiencies can lead to a lack of comprehensive structure and direction, insufficient understanding of risks and uncertainties, or the relearning of lessons from previous initiatives (i.e. making the same again mistakes).

How It Creates Planning Debt: When essential aspects of an initiative are not adequately understood or addressed, it can lead to a reactionary mode where risks and issues are managed as they arise rather than being anticipated. While this approach offers flexibility, it can also lead to “surprises” that require considerable rework to address.

Example: A city planning to upgrade its public transportation without sufficient foresight into population growth trends might have to retrofit the entire system later to accommodate increased demands rather than building space into the original design that makes future expansion easier.

3. Misaligned Planning: The Directional Dilemma

What is Misaligned Planning?: Misaligned planning occurs when the direction or focus of a planning activity does not correspond with the actual needs, objectives, or realities of the situation. More colloquially, it’s “planning the wrong things.”

How It Creates Planning Debt: A plan that doesn’t sync with real-world needs or goals can lead to misguided efforts. Not only does this result in wasted resources, but it also necessitates a recalibration of strategy and efforts as we discover these gaps, creating additional costs and rework. Or worse, it results in outputs that don’t achieve the desired outcomes.

Example: A city government launches a new digital portal, believing it will provide residents better access to services. Yet, it didn’t consult the older population, who find the new system confusing and inaccessible, leading to frustration and the need for additional unanticipated offline service channels.

Wrap up

I humbly present the concept of planning debt, hoping to spark further dialogue. I’d love to hear what you think.

I believe we can make better decisions by acknowledging the future “dept” that over-planning, under-planning, and misaligned planning might create the given unique context and constraints of our initiatives.

Until next time, I'll see you Beyond the Status Quo.