Strategic Planning Elements

In the highly competitive business environment and for an organization to be sustainable and prosperous in its business industry, an organization must engage in strategic planning which will help to place an organization’s direction in doing its business. It is a process of analyzing and developing to move an organization or destination from its current competitive position to a more desirable future competitive situation.

According to Lamb (1984), “Strategic management is an ongoing process that assesses the business and the industries in which the company is involved; assesses its competitors and sets goals and strategies to meet all existing and potential competitors; and then reassesses each strategy annually or quarterly [i.e. regularly] to determine how it has been implemented and whether it has succeeded or needs replacement by a new strategy to meet changed circumstances, new technology, new competitors, a new economic environment., or a new social, financial, or political environment.” [1]

It was also supported by Alfred Chandler as he recognized the importance of coordinating the various aspects of management under one all-encompassing strategy. Prior to this time the various functions of management were separate with little overall coordination or strategy. Interactions between functions or between departments were typically handled by a boundary position, that is, there were one or two managers that relayed information back and forth between two departments. Chandler also stressed the importance of taking a long term perspective when looking to the future. In his 1962 innovative work Strategy and Structure, Chandler showed that a long-term coordinated strategy was necessary to give a company structure, directi...

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...us improvement and being sustainable organization. It was also supported by David F., (1989) that “Strategic management is the art and science of formulating, implementing and evaluating cross-functional decisions that will enable an organization to achieve its objectives.” [4]

References:

1. Lamb, Robert, Boyden Competitive strategic management, Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1984

2. Chandler, Alfred Strategy and Structure: Chapters in the history of industrial enterprise, Doubleday, New York, 1962.

3. Modelling of Strategic Analysis in Strategic Management by Sigitas Vaitkevicius, Engineering Economics No. 4, 2006.

4. David, F Strategic Management, Columbus:Merrill Publishing Company, 1989.

5. Strategic Management and Business Policy by Thomas L. Wheelen and J. David Hunger, Pearson Prentice Hall : Pearson Internation Edition (11th Edition), 2008.