Does strategic planning ‘work’ in public organizations? Insights from Flemish municipalities

© 2017 CIPFA Strategic planning (SP) is a popular management instrument in contemporary public sector organizations (Bryson, 2010). Typically, SP is operationalized as a systematic process of strategy formulation during which an organization’s environment is analysed and strategic goals are defined (Poister et al., 2013; George et al., 2016a). Despite its popularity, the effectiveness of SP is strongly debated (Ugboro et al., 2011). Some argue that the complex adaptive context of public organizations inhibits effective application of SP and incremental processes might be needed (see, for example, Bovaird, 2008). Additionally, recent reviews have shown that there is a lack of large sample evidence testing the effectiveness of SP in public organizations (Bryson et al., 2010; Poister et al., 2010). Nonetheless, it is hard to deny the omnipresence of strategic plans in the public sector and the question that emerges is: