Impacts of strategic planning and management in municipal government: An analysis of subjective survey and objective production and efficiency measures in Norway

Abstract

This article analyzes impacts of formal strategic planning, strategic types, stakeholder involvement, and their interactions on performance in Norwegian municipalities. Internal stakeholders often overstate their organization’s performance. Therefore, the analysis complements subjective survey data on strategic planning, strategy content and the senior officials’ perceptions of the impacts of the strategic planning, with more objective administrative data of municipal production, efficiency and change in efficiency. Moderated multiple regression analyses show that strategic planning and a defender strategy had positive perceived impacts. The analyses with administrative data for performance showed little significant positive impacts of strategic planning, strategy content and stakeholder involvement.