1. Classic Management in a County Government
[Your Name]
September 1, 2008

2. Classic Management Activities
Planning
Organizing
Leading
Controlling
Planning is the process of selecting priorities and desired results and deciding how those results will be achieved. This process involves identifying goals, objectives, methods, and resources needed to carry out and complete the tasks. Examples of planning activities include business planning, strategic planning, project planning and staffing planning.
Organizing is the allocation of resources to accomplish the desired goals and objectives that were established during the planning phase. Organizing could entail personal organization, tasks, jobs, roles, or staff.
Leading is the process of establishing direction and influencing people to follow that direction. This is using authority to get things done.
Controlling is the monitoring or measuring and adjusting of resources to achieve goals and objectives. This could involve feedback mechanisms such as surveys, measures for operations or the actual execution of tasks, or it could evaluate organization performance with a balanced scorecard or other measurement mechanism (McNamara).

3. County Government Water Resources Group Planning
Use of three types of plans: broad-scoped strategic plan, more specific tactical plan, operational plan.
Outside forces such as public opinion, legislative changes, and emergencies make strategic plan development difficult.
Shifts in the strategic plan trickles down and affects budget and operations.
Sarasota County Government in Sarasota, Florida, is an interesting example of an organization that is adjusting the classic management activity structure to better meet the needs of the community. In the past, the organization was structured in rigid departments with a distinct hierarchy. The government lacked clear strategic goals and performance management on both the enterprise or community level and the employee level. Over the past four years, Sarasota County has invested an immense amount of time, money, and resources to re-organize and rebuilt their enterprise based on classic management activities with some modifications.
For planning activities, an ideal organization would have three types of plans: a broad-scoped strategic plan with a time horizon of 3 to 5 years, a more specific tactical plan with a time horizon of 1 to 2 years, and a narrower operational plan that is usually focused on a time frame of less than a year (Kibert).
While Sarasota County has a strategic plan and operational plans, the strategic plan is the least developed. Efforts are being made, especially in the Water Resources division, to create a 5 year strategic plan. Difficulties arise when outside forces influence what is included in the plan. These influences include opinions and priorities of the County Commission, legislative changes in regulations or priorities, and emergency issues such as drought or hurricanes. The trickle-down effect of these changes affects the tactical and operational plans making it difficult to allocate proper resources. Budgets for operational plans are often established more than a year in advance. How these budgets are allocated is supposed to be dependent upon the tactical and operational plans, however, if goals and priorities are shifting, then the budget and resource allocations must shift also.

4. County Control Activities
Balanced Scorecard System
Community and Enterprise Goals
Business Process Goals
Process Activity Goals
All levels related and attached to budget.
The controlling aspect of management includes measuring how goals are being achieved. This involves use of tools to provide feedback on the progress of activities. At Sarasota County, there has been difficulty in establishing feedback measures, though much progress has been made in recent years. The county government is utilizing a balanced scorecard system. At the top level are enterprise and community goals. Much like the top level of strategic planning, these are broad goals that are to be supported by all of the different government entities. Below these top goals are business processes and process activities. The process activities are those goals at the individual or group level and should be included in the annual operational plan and budget.

5. Challenges
Changes priorities make it difficult in planning and organizing.
Changes in plans make measurement of goals challenging.
Other challenges in measuring include lack of baseline, measures too ambiguous, or lack of industry standard.
Difficulties with the measuring process occurs when there is a lack of a baseline measure, the measures are too ambiguous or there is a lack of an industry standard. An example of this is the Key Performance Indicator of seagrass coverage in Sarasota Bay. The measurement process itself involves a method that has repeatedly changed, making comparisons with past years’ data difficult. Secondly, the measure cannot take into account external factors such as weather or climate change. Though it is well documented that seagrasses provide habitat for many species of game fish, and Sarasota County has established a community goal of making Sarasota waters fishable and swimmable, there is some question as to how useful the seagrass coverage measure really is.

6. Conclusion
Organizations can use the classic management activities as a guide or template, but the execution of these activities will vary from company to company and between internal divisions of those companies.

7. References
Kibert, C. Overview of Planning. Retrieved July 31, 2008, from
Spring2005/Organization+Directing+Controlling-Spring2006-
Kibert.ppt#322,3,Overview of Planning
McNamara, C. Skills and Practices in Organizational Management. Retrieved July
31, 2008, from Free Management Library,
Sarasota County Key Performance Indicators, Retrieved July 31, 2008, from