The Situation of Development Planning in the Iranian State Universities

The new conditions of environment and its contingencies have resulted in some special dynamism and complexity for universities. In such circumstances, the universities dynamism, quality and development strongly depends on a dynamic planning thinking and developing and implementing of relevant plans to the universities internal and external conditions. In fact, it is necessary that the major guidelines for the future of the university dynamism be described and delivered based on a dynamic process of strategic diagnosis and direction. This may empower the university toward an effective mobility in the environment and maintain its organizational health. This paper aims to examine the current situation of university development planning (UDP) based on the availability of following six indicators: 1) a clear and common understanding about UDP process, 2) documented development plans for universities, 3) the relevance of the universities development plans to their environmental conditions, 4) the relevance of the universities development plans to their capabilities and internal conditions, 5) necessary facilities, resources, and structures for planning in universities, and 6) the quality of decision making in universities. The findings showed that the situation of UDP in all universities is not suitable. Additionally, the conditions of any single group of advantaged, semi-advantaged and non-advantaged universities regarding to the indicators and assessing criteria was not satisfactory and no significant difference between indicators situation among these three groups of universities was reported. On the other hand, although the Heads of departments have pointed out that decentralization in UDP is a necessary and useful action but there is a considerable weakness in the required basic foundations for forming an effective behavioral system of UDP in universities.