AN ITERATIVE APPROACH TO STRATEGIC PLANNING OF SOCIAL SERVICES AT REGIONAL LEVEL

The process of preparing documents for planning the development of the social sector in general and social services in particular is associated with a number of challenges. On the one hand, it is necessary to comply with standard normative and methodological regulations related to the preparation of a planning document. On the other hand, the dynamics of social needs resulting from changes in the environment require greater agile approach and proactivity of social policies and the documents regulating them. All this requires a fundamentally new approach to the creation and subsequent implementation of strategies for social services development. The research problem of the study is the strategies for social services development in the Republic of Bulgaria at regional level and the research area is the approach to their creation. The main research thesis is that the application of an iterative approach to strategic planning of social services in the public sector is a tool for proactive policy, oriented to dynamically changing social needs in response to changes in the environment. The iterative approach presents strategic planning process as separate steps that are constantly repeating, i.e. the approach is cyclical. This means that strategies for social services development, once established and consulted with stakeholders, are not finalized. They require active actions for their implementation, monitoring, updating, and reporting, which should be widely communicated not only at institutional, but also at sectoral and functional levels. The aim of the scientific research is to present a fundamentally new for the public sector and for the social sphere conceptual approach to social services strategic planning, which will allow for an agile application of proactive behaviour.