Planning in the PDCA cycle constitutes the first and fundamental stage of quality processes. At this stage, it is necessary to clearly determine the problem or issue that needs to be improved, analyze the current situation and present opportunities.
The Planning stage according to resources includes the following elements:
- Listing the needs according to their importance and determining the options that will have the greatest impact within the framework of the available possibilities.
- Determining what will be done, when, by whom and with whom, together with the goals and objectives, will allow the process to proceed more healthily.
- Determining the risks and making a plan on how to manage these risks will make the management of the process realistic.
- Determining the qualitative or quantitative criteria related to the goals is among the tasks that need to be done at this stage.
- This is the first step that needs to be taken to create a quality management system. In this process, answers to questions such as who is the target audience, what are the requests and expectations of the target audience and employees should be included.
- It is determined what kind of system should be designed to meet the requests and expectations.
- Quality policies, goals and objectives are created at this stage.
- It is evaluated what needs to be done to present the best with the least cost.
- It is determined how the steps in the process will be planned.
- As stated in the Higher Education Quality Board Graded Evaluation Key, plans are created for quality assurance processes or mechanisms at this stage.
In summary, the Planning stage of the PDCA cycle is a critical stage in which an institution determines what it wants to improve in its quality processes, analyzes the current situation, sets goals and draws a roadmap to achieve these goals. A successful planning stage forms the basis for the effective execution of the other stages of the cycle.