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Stocks Drop as Oil Reaches Record
U.K. stocks dropped as oil reached a record $78 a barrel, spurring concern higher
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UK
High Court to Hear Yukos Challenge to Rosneft IPO
Russian oil company Yukos' challenge to state-owned rival Rosneft's high-profile
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UK's
Ofcom to Legalise Low-Power FM Transmitters
Ofcom is planning to legalise low-power FM transmitters, allowing MP3 players
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Microsoft
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Microsoft Business Solutions is to foot the bill for recruiting 400 new consultants
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EC Begins
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Or is it a war? Yesterday's public hearing on the future of pan-European patent
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Oracle
signs up Ingram Micro Europe
Ingram Micro has picked up wholesale rights for Oracle's full range of software,
to flog into the SME market. The distie giant is kicking off in Germany and the
UK before venturing out to the rest of EMEA.
U.S.,
U.K. Tag RFID For Scrutiny, Regulation
In the U.S., an RFID caucus of government and industry representative was launched today, while on the other side of the Atlantic, 31 global organizations have formed an RFID consortium and secured more than $7.5 million in funding from an EU agency.
Franchising
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There are more than 600 franchise opportunities available in the UK . Franchising
is simply a method of marketing goods or services under licence. The owner of
the business brand(The Franchisor) grants a licence for a company or individual...
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07.14.06
The Meaning And Importance Of Corporate Strategy
 By
Verena Veneeva
Corporate strategy is supposed to be the means by which an organisation achieves
and sustains success.
Yet, it rarely rises to that level, despite an abundance of corporate strategy theory and significant research from many organisations over the past few decades. The changes over the years are considered in the form of small, theoretical refinements, rather than large and significant steps required for further management transition (Papers4you.com, 2006).
What explains the relative failure of most organisations to create effective strategy? Part of the problem is that corporations and their managers have great difficulty clearly and consistently defining what corporate strategy is, and much of that struggle can be traced to their interpretation of the word strategy itself.
The original meaning of the word strategy derives from the Geek strategia, which
is used in the military terms and represents the ability to employ available resources
to win a war. This interpretation has generated problems when such concept is
used in a business context because it implies the existence, even the necessity,
of opponents. As a result, most managers believed that a corporate strategy implies
a strong focus on competition, since competition takes place almost exclusively
at the offering level, most organisations concentrate their strategic efforts
on constantly improving the goods and services they offer.
This overemphasis on the temporary success, however, can often obscure the kind
of thinking and emphasis that would lead to sustained success, even a continuous
repetition of temporary successes doesn't equate to sustainable strategy. In an
effort to increase the value of single offerings, the organisation may be distracted
from larger questions of structure, mission and objective (Papers4you.com, 2006).
In war, objectives can often be clearly defined, and so strategy is thought of as a means to a specific end. This view has persisted in the corporate world where strategies are conceived as plans to accomplish specific goals. Although corporate strategy can be very goal-oriented, especially in the early stages of a company's development, the very nature of goals implies temporary success. By contrast, sustainable success is not, and cannot be an end unto itself or a goal to achieve. Therefore, goal orientation becomes arguably inappropriate when success has to be indefinitely sustained.
Despite this, an overwhelming number of top executives and researchers make extensive
use of objectives in their quest of lasting corporate success. Certainly, a number
of factors contribute to this: the need of leaders with limited tenure to point
to achievements, the tyranny of meeting the expectations of the financial markets
and most management teams extensively rely on forecasting and planning.
Still, the idea held by most managers that strategy itself is all about goal achievement
only exacerbates the situation. Therefore, it is important for strategists to
remember that the more specific an objective, the further away it may potentially
lead the organisation from its optimal big picture.
So how strategy should be redefined? Clearly it cannot rely too strongly on objectives
nor can it focus too heavily on competition. A more fundamental concept is needed
to guide an organisation in seeing its big picture, and such concept should be
customer.
To create sustainable, long-term success, an organisation must first and fundamentally
understand and relate to its customers. It is the ongoing encouragement of this
understanding, based on neither specific competitors nor temporal objectives,
which must be at the heart of any real strategy. And it is that from which all
objectives should naturally flow.
Article
References
About the Author:
Copyright © 2006 Verena Veneeva. Professional Writer working for http://www.coursework4you.co.uk |
