Plan well or execute well?

In order to optimise your performance and enrich your learning journey, you need to lay a definite groundwork first. In today’s world, where technological knowhow is evolving with each day, students lack fore-thought as they have been brought up in the age of social media and instant success. They are so much used to making instant decisions and leaving things to the last minute that they struggle when they have to think or plan in advance. As a result, their study habits have become random, unorganised and ineffective. As students, you should keep in mind that random or unplanned study habits result in poor scores and a poor comprehension of the curriculum. This in turn affects the overall performance. Planning, in other words, lays foundation for effective learning. But do only plans help you reach the pinnacle of success?

Let us delve in further and find out what is more important to bank on when thinking of success- planning or execution?

Planning aims to quadruple learner base by helping you set goals, track progress and keep organised. Planning is the most significant phase in order to achieve success. Without proper planning, you cannot have clear guidelines as planning provides a coherent framework for smooth and efficient learning, offers direction to your goals, keeps you organised and confident and finally leads to success. Moreover, every action requires rigorous planning and practice without which goals cannot be achieved. A little planning, thus, goes a long way and is a screening factor in every academic step further. After all, as the adage goes, “If you fail to plan, you plan to fail.”

A good plan is important, but a good execution is critical. You cannot achieve success without executing your plans efficiently. However, the road to successful execution is full of potholes. Everyone can have same plans or goals but what plays the key role here is execution. A well executed plan separates a winner from a loser. Moreover, a lot of impetus and onus is laid on how well you execute as good execution makes up for the flaws in planning, if any, and help you climb the ladder of success.

It is also worth noting that, without right execution, no plan, however great it is, can flourish or thrive. As Steve Jobs remarks, “To me, ideas are worth nothing unless executed. They are just a multiplier. Execution is worth millions.” It can be, thus, inferred that a plan cannot survive without execution in place and would probably wither and die. Moreover, it’s the implementation of plans that determines whether the plan you have is good or bad. If you can’t execute a plan correctly, it can bring you lot of disappointment and destruction.

Having a plan is great but how you pull it off makes you stand out from all the rest. For example, there are innumerable cars on road but no one can beat German cars in design or performance. It’s the result of its carefully-designed and well executed plan that only a few are able to match it even in today’s time. Yet another example is of Google. Can you relate to the time when there used to be numerous search engines? But with Google, the whole definition changed so much that it is now commonly used as a verb to search online. It is only because of a great plan executed greatly.

Same goes for academics. If you make high-end plans but don’t work hard to execute them, you can never achieve success. Mere planning cannot help you make a smooth transition into a successful career or into a college and course of your choice. What you need is strong determination, dedication and insurmountable hardwork to execute your plans. Clinical planning and putting those plans into execution can help you kick up a notch and spur amazing feats.

So, which is more important to achieve your goals: planning or execution?

Interestingly, if planning is deciding what to do, execution is all about making it happen. Only a brilliant plan and a solid execution can stand you in a good stead.  Both planning and execution are equally important to achieve your goals as one leads to another. You cannot prioritise one and disregard the other.