Strategic planning, which requires careful assessment of future trends and ways of improving current practice, is an essential responsibility for all school managers. The Teacher Training Agency in the United Kingdom has made it a compulsory element of the new National Professional Qualification for the headship. This book sets out broad guidelines for effective planning. It investigates the key features necessary for success and provides practical suggestions for developing a strategic plan that fits the individual school. Chapter 1 describes issues in planning and makes the case for strategic planning. Chapter 2 provides an overview of systems-analysis approach to strategic planning, and chapter 3 presents a case study of a firm that used systems analysis. Chapters 4 through 8 explore in detail the various approaches to strategy review and development, including the customer approach, the strategic challenge of matching customer expectation with professional judgment, the competencies-and-standards approach, the learning-organization plan, and Deming's 14-point model. The final chapter highlights organizational-learning theory. Checklists, suggested activities, 14 figures, and an index are included. (Contains 14 references.) (LMI)