Software to assist with programme planning: two community-based cases

摘要

Programme planning in public health is defined as a continuous process for estimating and allocating resources and services that are needed to meet predetermined objectives according to established priorities. These estimations guide the planner in choosing the best actions to take among various alternatives while taking into account contextual constraints and resources. Although models exist that can facilitate programme planning in health promotion (Simons-Morton, Simons-Morton, Parcel and Bunker, 1988; Kreuter, 1992), three types of tasks are common across most models. These tasks represent strategic, tactical and operational planning (Kaufman, Herman and Watters, 1996). Strategic planning refers to the process of creating a vision and defining objectives that link effective and efficient tactics. At a very basic level, it consists of defining the programme's goals and mission. In strategic planning, there are essentially three tasks: identifying the problems; establishing priorities; and creating goals and objectives. Tactical planning is the organisation of actions and resources; the tasks are to determine the sequence of actions necessary to attain the objectives and to estimate the resources required for conducting those actions. Finally, operational planning specifies how program resources will be used by defining the "how to" of implementation. In operational planning, an implementation plan is formulated to translate objectives into day-to-day programme operation (McConley, 1981; Bartholomew, Parcel and Kok, 1998).