ABSTRACT
Environmental scanning provides leaders at all levels with fresh ideas, enhances credibility, and ensures vigilance with regard to unexpected events. Environmental scanning is important for all organizations; however, the importance of good environmental scanning is more obvious in military and public safety functions where lives are at stake. Strategic planning is part of the strategic management complex in contemporary organizations: strategic planning, performance measurement, program evaluation, and performance budgeting. Articulating the mission has both explicit and implicit aspects. The explicit elements are the various types of mission statements that are used as a part of strategic planning, public relations, budget documents, and internal communications. Values are expressed through the various operating philosophies of the organization, having to do with governance systems, organizational structures, and systems of accountability.
