The current practice of bank long-range planning

This paper reports on a recent survey of long-range planning practices in 105 large United States banks. The survey results indicate that long range planning is a relatively new corporate activity with more than half the respondents initiating long range planning the last 5 years. To the extent these banks lead others, this finding suggests greater adoption of long range planning systems in small and medium size banks in the future. Profitability and growth goals are the primary goals quantified in the planning process. These goals are pursued via various strategies. Profit goals are typically pursued by improving pricing policies, adjusting mix and maturity of assets and liabilities to minimize adverse effects of interest rate fluctuations, managing spreads through proper loan pricing and bond portfolio management and tightening cost control with a particular emphasis on non-interest expense. Growth goals are achieved by branch expansion, use of bank holding companies, and increased market penetration through product diversification and sales training programmes designed to develop new business. In addition, information is presented on trends that appear to be developing in the area of long-range planning in the banking industry.     

Impact of customer loyalty and service operations on customer behaviour and firm performance: empirical evidence from UK retail sector

Abstract

Retail networks are striving to achieve competitive advantage by increasing value through loyalty and efficiency with a focus on service operations. As sales promotions have become an integral part of the retail supply chain planning, customer behavioural aspects based on loyalty and service operations have been challenged greatly. Subsequently, management capabilities, such as planning and timely replenishment, have become complicated tasks for many retail store managers. This study develops a model integrating retail network value and efficiencies with customer behaviour and performance. We validate the model using survey data from prominent U.K. retail store customers. Our data analysis shows that both loyalty and service operation attributes have positive significant impact on customer behaviour, while the service operation mediates the relationship between loyalty and customer behaviour. This result gives a new outlook to build managerial capability based on customer loyalty and service operations. Our results specifically show that the service operation attributes will indirectly influence the customers’ buying behaviour even in the presence of loyalty attribute such as promotion schemes. This result sends a strong signal to retail supply chain managers to offer customised promotions considering local community rather than having uniform sales promotion nationwide.     

Municipal Budget Management and the Generation of Urban Sprawl. A Case Study of the Lombardy Region (Italy)

ABSTRACT

The paper describes one of the Italian sprawl drivers: the circle triggered by the use of urban charges to solve budget problems. From 2005 to 2018, Italian municipalities could use urban charges to solve normal budget problems: they could plan new urban areas to provide new urban charges, new building and services, and they could manage old and new services at the expense of normal budget. The planning of unnecessary urban areas was effectively influenced by budget problems. The paper illustrates this issue during a period without open data sources in order to improve land management and environmental sustainability.     

A Methodology for Integrating Tsunami Inundation Modelling into Land Use Planning in New Zealand

Guidance has been produced for land use planners and decision-makers on how tsunami inundation modelling can be included into land use planning. The process of developing the guideline included exploring the difficulties in integrating physical science models into land use planning with a focus on tsunami. These difficulties included addressing uncertainty and reconciling planners' needs with the capability of the modellers. The guidance was based on two key questions. (1) How can tsunami modelling be incorporated into land use planning? (2) What information do planners need from modellers to improve planning and policy for tsunami? The purpose of this paper is to provide a brief overview of the guideline, with the aim of assisting others in producing similar guidance for implementing tsunami modelling into land use planning. The guideline includes tsunami basics, a decision tree for including tsunami risk into land use planning, which forms the basis of the guideline.     

Application of fuzzy goal programming technique to land use planning in agricultural system

This paper presents how fuzzy goal programming can be efficiently used for modelling and solving land-use planning problems in agricultural systems for optimal production of several seasonal crops in a planning year. In the model formulation of the problem, utilization of total cultivable land, supply of productive resources, aspiration levels of various production of crops as well as the total expected profit from the farm are fuzzily described. In the decision-making situation, minimization of the under-deviational variables of the membership goals with highest membership value (unity) as their achievement levels defined for the membership functions of the fuzzy goals of the problem on the basis of the priorities of importance of achieving the aspired levels of the fuzzy goals to the extent possible is considered. As a study region, the District Nadia, West Bengal, India is taken into account. To expound the potential use of the approach, the model solution is compared with the existing cropping plan of the District as well as a solution of the problem obtained by using the additive fuzzy goal programming model studied by Tiwari et al. (Fuzzy sets and systems 24(1987)27.) previously.     

Children and Planning: To What Extent Does the Scottish Town Planning System Facilitate the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child?

Children are often not given explicit attention in land use planning outside of allocating space for schools, parks and playgrounds. This is problematic as children both use and navigate beyond these settings, and findings from research on and with children report how they are frequently marginalized in society. This is partly affected by the way town planning systems treat children's spatial needs and participation. Therefore, this article investigates whether and how the Scottish town planning system acknowledges children, particularly in light of the internationally recognized rights set out in the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC). It uses critical discourse analysis of key Scottish planning policies, along with a survey of Scotland's planning authorities to ascertain the extent to which children are provided for and participate in the system. It argues that children's rights are not widely acknowledged or incorporated into town planning policy and practice, and suggests this must be addressed to achieve greater social justice and support Scotland's commitments as a signatory of the UNCRC.     

Defining goals—A systems approach

Most planning strategies include a goal development phase, yet very little concrete information is available in the program planning literature to help the planner know what a goal is or should be. Goals play an important role in systems theory and the theory offers a structure for the careful defining of goals. This article identifies the function of goals in systems as being the facilitation of evaluation and control. From this system functional analysis viewpoint, several specific characteristics of goals are derived and discussed.     

Planning Strategically or by the Book?—Contentious Land Use Planning in South-eastern Finland

The debate on strategic spatial planning highlights the limitations of statutory land use planning in weighing up future options for spatial development, particularly in instances of rapid change. This paper draws on this debate in order to analyse planning institutions and practices in Finland. The case in point is the south-eastern border region where interdependencies with Russia, particularly shopping tourism, have created pressures on land use and led to contentious planning processes between regional and central levels of government. It is argued that, in the absence of cross-border spatial co-ordination, there is a need to establish links between regional land use planning and visions of spatial scenarios in the national context.     

An Evaluation of the Capacity-building Effects of Participatory GIS (PGIS) for Public Participation in Land Use Planning

Spatial participatory methods called ‘participatory GIS’ (PGIS) are intended to improve public participation for land use planning. An internet PGIS was implemented in Perlis, Malaysia, to examine the public capacity-building effects of PGIS. Two delivery modes (facilitated and self-administered) were evaluated. We found that PGIS significantly enhanced perceived public knowledge about place and land use planning while increasing spatial technology skills, regardless of implementation mode. The results indicate that PGIS can increase public capacity for participating in land use planning, an important finding for developing countries with historically low levels of public participation and low public awareness and knowledge of planning.     

Experiences of running negotiable and non-negotiable developer contributions side-by-side

In England, Since the 1970s, a system of negotiated project-specific agreements between local planning authorities and developers/landowners has evolved into the sole mechanism by which part of land value uplift ‘released’ by the grant of planning permission is captured by government. In 2010, in an attempt to simplify and speed up the planning process – negotiated planning agreements were regarded as time-consuming and a brake on development – the Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) was introduced. Originally intended as a simple flat rate charge to replace site-specific planning agreements, CIL now sits alongside that mechanism so that developers pay CIL to help fund infrastructure provision in the locality, whilst planning agreements help mitigate the impact of their development and provide affordable housing. The experience of running a system of negotiated planning agreements alongside a non-negotiable infrastructure levy offers an opportunity to evaluate these policy shifts in order to assess their strengths and weaknesses and whether there are any wider lessons for international discussions of best practice in land value capture. Drawing on survey findings the paper considers the implementation of CIL alongside planning agreements, the revenue and expenditure patterns, and the impact of these combined land value capture mechanisms on development activity and, in particular, on affordable housing supply.     

Assessing Major Accident Risks to Support Land‐Use Planning Using a Severity‐Vulnerability Combination Method: A Case Study in Dagushan Peninsula,China

Major accident risks posed by chemical hazards have raised major social concerns in today's China. Land‐use planning has been adopted by many countries as one of the essential elements for accident prevention. This article aims at proposing a method to assess major accident risks to support land‐use planning in the vicinity of chemical installations. This method is based on the definition of risk by the Accidental Risk Assessment Methodology for IndustrieS (ARAMIS) project and it is an expansion application of severity and vulnerability assessment tools. The severity and vulnerability indexes from the ARAMIS methodology are employed to assess both the severity and vulnerability levels, respectively. A risk matrix is devised to support risk ranking and compatibility checking. The method consists of four main steps and is presented in geographical information‐system‐based maps. As an illustration, the proposed method is applied in Dagushan Peninsula, China. The case study indicated that the method could not only aid risk regulations on existing land‐use planning, but also support future land‐use planning by offering alternatives or influencing the plans at the development stage, and thus further enhance the roles and influence of land‐use planning in the accident prevention activities in China.     

The hazards of strategic planning for global markets

Global strategic marketing planning has emerged as a key process in managing today's worldwide marketplace. This survey of 90 large American global corporations reveals that most are bottom-up planners. US firms appear to have distinct cost and numbers orientations. Industry and competitive analyses are used in many companies, although managers appear to lack suitable frameworks for SWOT analyses. Economic climate changes tend to be most disruptive to global planning efforts. When faced with non-achievement of goals, most firms reformulate both objectives and strategies.     

Spatial Planning in Ghana: Exploring the Contradictions

The purpose of this research is twofold: to explore the complexity of spatial plan preparation and implementation in Ghana using Kumasi as a case study; and second, to examine the contradictions of spatial plans and ‘actual development’ occurring in Kumasi. Using social science research methods (semi-structured interviews) and physical survey (land use plans), findings indicate that spatial planning in Kumasi is a bureaucratic process hijacked by urban planning agencies with limited involvement of urban residents. As a result, urban development is considerably influenced by spontaneous informal development patterns (i.e. self-organization). This phenomenon of self-organization is expressed in a context of uncertainty created by weak spatial planning system which encourages haphazard development. Regrettably, in Kumasi, self-organization is often overlooked by spatial planning agencies as they focused on rigid and exclusionary spatial plans. This paper advocates consideration and integration of self-organization processes in spatial planning efforts to respond adequately to the urban development challenges confronting Kumasi.     

The dangers of centralized economic planning

There is little evidence that there is much value in riveting attention on the question of strategic planning in an era of low growth or negative growth. Rather, there is value in discussing strategic planning in terms of the efficient realization of society's goals— whether expressed as economic goals or as non-economic aspirations. This article contains some observations on corporate strategic planning, provides perspective on the energy and materials scarcity question, and warns that detailed economic planning by government thwarts the optimal use of resources to improve living conditions for everyone. The author holds that renewed government reliance upon the workings of a competitive market economy is indispensable for achieving this goal.     

Implications of Applying the Green Infrastructure Concept in Landscape Planning for Ecosystem Services in Peri-Urban Areas: An Expert Survey and Case Study

This paper investigates how planning experts understand the potential of integrating the concept of green infrastructure in planning practice in Germany. It develops a systematic approach for green infrastructure planning at the landscape scale. Research methods include a web-based survey among German planning experts and geographic information system analysis in the case study region of Hannover. Survey results suggest that the green infrastructure concept is not yet well known in planning practice, and that the potential benefits for planning lie primarily in communication purposes. An approach is developed here that sets priorities for green infrastructure development based on its potentials for creating synergies in the provision of ecosystem services.     

Land use planning and the community

For more effective land use to become a reality, the authors argue, citizens must become actively involved in the decision-making process. There must be educational programmes to make people more aware of the alternatives and principles of land use planning. There must also be incentives provided to stimulate citizen input into land use decisions.     

Critical Dimensions of Strategic Information Systems Planning

Strategic information systems planning (SISP) is the process whereby an organization establishes a long-range plan of computer-based applications in order to achieve its goals. A number of problems can potentially impede information systems planners as they carry out the process. A survey of 80 firms who completed the SISP process revealed that the problems constitute five factors: the organization, implementation, database, hardware, and cost. A discriminant analysis showed that three factors—the organization, implementation, and database—best distinguished satisfied from dissatisfied information systems planners. A research application of the five factors suggested that organizations with more sophisticated business planning endure significantly less severe hardware and implementation problems.     

Retail category management: State-of-the-art review of quantitative research and software applications in assortment and shelf space management

Retail requires efficient decision support to manage increasing product proliferation and various consumer choice effects with limited shelf space. Our goal is to identify, describe and compare decision support systems for category planning. This research analyzes quantitative models and software applications in assortment and shelf space management and contributes to a more integrated modeling approach. There are difficulties commonly involved in the use of commercial software and the implementation and transfer of scientific models. Scientific decision models either focus on space-dependent demand or substitution effects, whereas software applications use simplistic rules of thumb. We show that retail assortment planning models neglect space-elastic demand and largely also ignore constraints of limited shelf space. Shelf space management streams on the other hand, mostly omit substitution effects between products when products are delisted orout-of-stock, which is the focus of consumer choice models in assortment planning. Also, the problem sizes of the models are often not relevant for realistic category sizes. Addressing these issues, this paper provides a state-of-the-art overview and research framework for integrated assortment and shelf space planning.     

Use of Redundant Industrial Buildings as Injections into the Cultural Sector in Norway

Prime aim is to examine the way the culture sector reuses industrial buildings to instigate cultural activities in the municipalities. The discussion of various actors’ motivation for engagement is based on results from a case study, supplemented with findings from a coarse-meshed telephone survey. At national level overarching political guidelines can be traced back to white papers concerning cultural policy, urban transformation and cultural heritage, and the municipalities’ cultural policies mirror these guidelines. What tends to decide if such initiatives are considered successful are local abilities to cross sectorial divisions and instigate cooperation between municipal planners, private entrepreneurs and NGOs.     

The Changing Face of Distribution Channels: Partial Forward Integration and Strategic Investments

Recent years have seen a drastic transformation in the organization of wholesale and retail markets. Where once clear distinctions between wholesale suppliers and retail competitors existed, now an era of blurring boundaries has emerged. This transformation has been marked by the introduction of online channels for suppliers to provide products directly to consumers while, at the same time, traditional retailers too persist. Thus, retailers are both wholesale customers and retail competitors of many manufacturers. The consequences of the rapid emergence of instances of such partial forward integration by suppliers are not yet fully known. To this end, we study how partial forward integration can affect competing firms' strategic investments. We find that integration shifts the environment from being one in which firms invest to undercut retail rivals to one in which firms invest more in boosting demand, even that of their competitors. A case in point is the tendency for a manufacturer to invest broadly in brand promotion (benefiting both itself and its retail competitor), rather than heavy promotion of its own sales channel. The shift in the nature of strategic investments arising from partial forward integration implies that such integration can benefit firms and consumers alike, even the firm which finds itself reliant on a competitor for supplies.