Strategic Management

• Management Functions - functions required to carry out the management process of organizing and monitoring the work performance of individuals working together in organizations.
• Coordination - harmonious, coordinated operation of the different parts and processes of the organization.
• Efficiency - the character of being able to produce the maximum output of the minimum input.
• Effectiveness - being adapted to produce an effect that will help the organization to achieve its objectives.
• Management - is getting things done through people.
• Management - is the process of organizing and managing the activities of people working together in organizations so that they can successfully achieve their preferred objectives or goals.
• Planning - involves the identification of the goals or performance objectives of the organization, the specification of the strategic steps to be taken to achieve them, and the implementation of planning and integration activities.
• Organizing - demands assigning responsibilities, setting aside funds, and bringing in harmonious relationships between individuals and working groups or teams within the organization.
• Staffing - Indicates the filling of different job positions in the structure of the organization; factors that affect this function include the size of the organization, the types of job, the number of individuals to be hired, and other internal or external pressures.
• Leading - it includes encouraging or motivating subordinates to do their best to help the company achieve its objectives.
• Controlling - it includes reviewing and, if necessary correcting the performance of individuals or working groups or teams to ensure that they are all working towards the objectives and goals of the organization previously set.
• Management Functions – planning, organizing, staffing, leading, and controlling – are all going to waste if coordination, efficiency, and effectiveness are not carried out by the assigned managers of the organization.
• Strategic Management is the art and science of formulating, implementing, and evaluating cross-functional decisions that enable an organization to achieve its objectives.
• Strategic Planning is more often used in the business world.
• Strategic Management is often used in academia.
• Strategic Management is used to refer to strategy formulation, implementation, and evaluation.
• Strategic Planning refers only to strategy formulation.
• Strategy Formulation – includes developing a vision and a mission, identifying an organization’s external opportunities and threats, determining internal strengths and weaknesses, establishing long-term objectives, generating alternative strategies, and choosing particular strategies to pursue.
• Strategy Implementation – requires a firm to establish annual objectives, devise policies, motivate employees, and allocate resources so that formulated strategies can be executed. The "action stage" of strategic management.
• Strategy Evaluation – the primary means for knowing when particular strategies are not working well. All strategies are subjected to future modification because external and internal factors constantly change.
• Formulation, implementation, and evaluation of strategy activities occur at three hierarchical levels in a large organization: corporate, divisional or strategic business unit, and functional.
• Peter Drucker says the prime task of strategic management is thinking through the overall mission of a business – that is, of asking the question, “What is our business?”
• Edward Deming once said, “In God we trust. All others bring data.”
• Intuition is essential to making good strategic decisions. Intuition is particularly useful for making decisions in situations of great uncertainty or little precedent.
• The strategic-management process is aimed at allowing organizations to adapt effectively to change over the long run.
• Waterman noted: In today’s business environment, more than in any preceding era, the only constant is change.
• Competitive Advantage – Any activity a firm does especially well compared to activities done by rival firms, or any resources a firm possesses that rival firms desire.
• Strategists – Are the individuals most responsible for the success or failure of an organization. Strategists help an organization gather, analyze, and organize information. They have various job titles, such as chief executive officer, president, owner, chair of the board, executive director, chancellor, dean, and entrepreneur.
• Developing a vision statement is often considered the first step in strategic planning, preceding even development of a mission statement.
• A mission statement identifies the scope of a firm’s operations in product and market terms.
• External Opportunities and Threats refer to economic, social, cultural, demographic, environmental, political, legal, governmental, technological, and competitive trends and events that could significantly benefit or harm an organization in the future.
• Environmental Scanning or Industry Analysis is the process of conducting research and gathering and assimilating external information.
• Internal Strengths and Weaknesses are an organization’s controllable activities that are performed especially well or poorly.
• Long-Term Objectives can be defined as specific results that an organization seeks to achieve in pursuing its basic mission. Long-term means more than one year.
• Strategies are the means by which long-term objectives will be achieved.

   
• Annual Objectives are short-term milestones that organizations must achieve to reach longterm objectives.
• Policies are the means by which annual objectives will be achieved.  Include guidelines, rules, and procedures established to support efforts to achieve stated objectives. Are guides to decision making and address repetitive or recurring situations.