Three levels of plan are used in PRINCE2.
The project plan is a high level 'helicopter' view of the whole project, used by the Project Board to keep on eye on the total project and to provide the figures (costs and timescales) on which the business case is based. This plan is created at the beginning of the project and then maintained and adjusted as the stages are completed.
The stage plan is the day-to-day management plan used by the project manager. The stage plan for the next stage is planned in detail as the current stage nears its end, thus ensuring that a stage plan is as accurate as it can be and the effects of the planning horizon are minimised.
The team plan is a subdivision of the stage plan and relates to the work package - the unit of work a project manager allocates to a team manager (who might be a subcontractor). Team plans contain the most detail. Team plans can be integrated into stage plans, so they are in effect optional.
Exception plans replace plans which have gone pear-shaped, normally after an exception has been raised and the exception plan option has been taken.
The Plans theme includes much detailed advice about a plannning process which in the 2005 version of PRINCE2 was a process in its own right. It's not clear what the logic is in integrating this detail into the plans theme, since, like it or not, planning is a process which all projects should go through.
