Careful planning always increases your chances of being successful. However, setting objectives and making decisions are very individual tasks. Some people like to write detailed plans, while others prefer to keep it all in their heads. On most grazing properties, the planning process is fairly informal, perhaps sometimes a little too informal for such complex systems.

Successful businesses navigate through their challenges because they plan for success. Effective planning delivers the following benefits:

• Concentrates effort and investment on the important things – the importance of something is determined by its relevance to your objectives and its ability to deliver on those objectives.
• Saves wasted effort and investment on the distractions – distractions are a cost to the business and only a disciplined approach to identifying them will prevent this waste.
• Job satisfaction – through clear progress towards your goals and objectives, and confidence in your ability to adjust to new challenges.
• Avoids losses from the real risks to your business – adverse circumstances cannot be avoided but, if you are prepared, they can be managed to minimise their impact.
• Avoids lost opportunities as a result of perceived risks – aversion to risk, or overestimation of individual risks, can lead to inertia, which, in turn, leads to missed opportunities.