Strategic Planning in Emergency Management: Highlighting the Critical Role (and Impacts) of the Planning Process

Strategic planning is a critical element in the strategic management of any public organization, including local emergency management agencies (EMAs). However, while the importance of strategic planning in emergency management is well founded, even codified in the national standards, little is known empirically about its actual use, and even less is known about the impacts of the planning process on local programs. As such, this study examined the strategic planning practices of county-level EMAs throughout the United States, focusing on the strategic planning process and its underlying dimensions. A composite index for strategic planning comprehensiveness was developed, based on five planning process dimensions, and then analyzed to gauge its relative impacts on local program quality. The findings revealed that the strategic planning process had a direct and significant impact on the quality of local emergency management programs, with the regression model explaining about 60 % of the variance in the local program quality index scores.