10x10 #8 Planning is essential. Plans change.

Whether you are thinking about an indiviual lesson or a series of lessons, a single student or a group of learners. If you are a school leader thinking about the strategic future of your organisation or if you're a policy maker considering the future of your system, planning is the most important thing you can do.

However, having a plan and then following it religiously even when it isn't working is the worst thing you can do. I get shown 'plans' all the time -from teachers right through to ministers and yet when I ask them to put that away and tell me what they're doing and why I often get a very different version of things ( or an uncomfortbale silence!). In other words, the plan has changed or perhaps isn't understood at all.

The process of planning, evaluating and re-planning is essential. Sticking to a plan that doesn't work, is out of date or you don't understand or believe in is a waste of everyone's time.

• Plans are of little importance, but planning is essential – Winston Churchill

• Plans are nothing; planning is everything. – Dwight D. Eisenhower