Planning is a standard business practice. The ultimate goals of planning and adaptive management are more effective strategies, better decision-making, continually improving return on investment and increased credibility with donors and stakeholders. But planning also supports other aims including being more transparent and accountable as managers and practitioners and as an organization. To those ends, the objectives of this guidance are to clarify expectations and help managers and teams focus on what is most important and useful in planning, as well as produce brief, useful and dynamic conservation business plans (hereafter referred to as “plans”).

This guidance provides:

• A basic planning framework based on a set of core questions and key elements
• A rationale for answering each question
• Suggested step-wise process guidanceLinks to additional resources, tools and examples
• Suggested plan content, format and outlines

TNC’s overall conservation planning framework is undergoing an update and new guidance materials and examples will be released in 2013. This guidance applies throughout the interim period. This is a living document and will be updated periodically based on user feedback.