Strategic Management in Action: Final Analysis Group 2: Andrew Maale, Kristy Strong, John White

Why Strategic Management is important Ch. 1

Strategic Management Organizations are constantly faced with changing situations both internally( capabilities/resources) and externally( opportunities/threats) and are still expected to meet a certain level of output. SM process Situation analysis- current situation Strategy Formulation- designing Strategy Implementation- action Strategy Evaluation- revisit and check Who’s involved The board of directors The top management team Other strategic managers and organizational employees

Competitive Advantage Ch.2 Resource Based View Organizational resources as competitive advantage Does it add value? Is it rare? Can firm exploit it? Is it hard to duplicate/substitute

Drivers of the new business environment Information revolution Technology Globalization Critical success factors Ability to embrace change Creativity and innovation capabilities Being a world class organization

External analysis Ch.3 Scanning and evaluating an organizations external environment Opportunities/threats Source of information/resources Environmental uncertainty (dynamic or stable) Specific environments General environments

Internal Analysis Process of evaluating an organization’s resources and capabilities. It is the only way to identify organization’s strengths and weaknesses It is needed for making good strategy decisions.

Functional Strategies Goal-directed plans and actions of the organization’s functional areas. The Product The People The Support Processes

Corporate Strategy Strategy concerned with the choices of what business/businesses to be in and what to do with them. Single-business organizations Multiple-business organizations The competitive strategy and various functional strategies are aligned with the overall direction that strategic managers have chosen for the organization and are being implemented.

Importance of Competitive Planning Competitive Environments are Inevitable Creating a Blue Ocean might not always be cost effective Sometimes forming a competitive strategy is more efficient Battle of Thermopylae

Battle of Thermopylae Best Possible use of Forces Pass at Thermopylae was ideally suited to the Greek style of warfare Greeks competitive strategy allowed them to take away the Persians quantitative advantage, to allow their strength to shine through, and their weaknesses covered up.

Strategic Management: Not Just for Business Management? Good to Great touches on this in Ch. 1 Education; Politics; Not For Profits Applying these concepts and measuring concepts in terms other than economic. Education = Graduation Rates & Test Scores Politics = ??? NFPs = Consistency of Short Term & Long Term Goals Achieved