Research Project

2014

Table of Contents

1.

Activity 1

01

2.

Activity 2

04

3.

Activity 3

08

4.

Activity 4

09

5.

References

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Research Project

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Activity 1
Preface
A way toward success in business is the other name of strategic planning. It is a process or
way or route to understand that what the position of business is, what goals are achieved and
what goals yet to achieve. The needs and wants of the stakeholders are reflected by strategic
planning. The challenges and threats in the way of business are also overcome by this
process.
By strategic planning vision and mission can be brought in the business life. All problems,
opportunities, trends and treats are considered as well as internal and external atmosphere of
business is also kept in eye. Manager of the company do this process and deliver it to his
shareholders. As the company flourishes strategic planning becomes the necessary part of that
company. Its need to become more intense. The vision and mission of the business and the
process of strategic planning should be understood by everyone in the organization (Cappele,
1999).
In order to achieve the success manager should translate the goals and missions of the
business to all employees and stakeholders. In this way they will work effectively and more
benefits of strategic planning will arise. For having better results and for achieving all the
desired objectives, strategic tactics are used (Benson, 2004).

Strategic Planning Process

The required process and steps of the strategic planning are given below:
First step is to understand what factors are needed the most attention in the present situation
and environment. Further step understands properly the segments e.g. all business sections
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like human resource, marketing, finance, accounting, production etc. should be checked. All
weakness, opportunities and strengths are analyzed in the third step. In the fourth step we
analyze what are the core competencies in business and analyze who are the strong
competitors in the market and what are their strong points and how can we compete them. To
check the success factors of the business is the fifth step of the strategic planning. To expose
all resources how these factors can be used and influence the strategic planning. Then the
next step which is sixth step is to check what is the strategic and business plan of the
organization and what type of emend mends and changes are required in it to make it more
suitable and reliable. To check the business score card is the seventh step of planning. The
last but most important step is to evaluate the whole system. Check the plans and strategies
are implemented or not and what are the chances of the success (Hitt, Hoskisson, 2008).

Alternative strategies
Different used strategies are (Hitt, Hoskisson, 2011):
Strategy

Elaboration

Backward integration

Getting ownership or seeking Chinese

control

over

Practical examples

the

automobile

business manufacturer

suppliers.

over

its

took

control

Australian

parts

supplier by purchasing it
Forward integration

Gaining the control and getting Pepsi bottling group was took
ownership

over

the over by the PepsiCo.

distributors/retailers.
Horizontal integration

Getting ownership or seeking Wyeth was acquired by Pfizer.

better

control

over

the Both produce drug products.

competitors.
Development of market
2

Introduction of something new 31 percent of the business of

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in the existing products and Central

launching it in new areas.

European

Enterprises

Media

Limited

was

bought by Time warner.

Market penetration

Increase market shares by Millions were spent by coke

more market efforts and also on his increasing market
increase the services.

Development of product

Growth in the business can be Harper

achieved
innovative

by
product

Collins

bringing innovation
or

by

brought
introducing

by audio book and published it

making changes in the existing through News Crop.

product
Unrelated diversification

Introduction of unrelated, new By getting all new technology

services and products.

Cisco Systems Inc. started

camcorder.

Related diversification

Introduction of related, new Garmin

Ltd.

services and products.

internet

wireless

Delivered
services

through GPS machines by

making

partnership

with

Sprint Nextel Corp.

Retrenchment

Reducing the cost of the ArcelorMittal fired many of

product and it increase the his employees and also shut of
profit by increasing the sales half of its plant.
and also reduction of asset
which were going to declining.

Divestiture

Business is to sell parts or Three

division of an organization.

airports

of

United

Kingdom was divested by a

BAA Ltd. This is a British

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airport firm.

Liquidation

Selling the assets in parts for Ann Arbor News is liquidated

their tangible value.

by the Detroit News. Detroit

free press is the newspapers of
Michigan.

Strategic Planning Issues

Common issues that a business strategic plan faces are given below:
1) Right People
Culture and structure of the ownership and business depend upon what type of
persons is involved in the strategic planning as well as the individual personality of
the employee. In ideal terms team should consist of more than 12 people. If the team
is larger than this there will be many issues regarding the team like there will be less
understanding between the team and ideas cannot be properly communicated. Team
should consist of some seniors because they can plan in much better way due to their
experiences. Management committee or board of directors of executives should be a
senior.
All team members should present their ideas and all ideas should be respected,
reviewed and considered (Hitt, Hoskisson, 2008).
2) Issues to be Avoided
Basic element in strategic planning is the assessment of the present condition in which
business is running. Everyone in the firm should have business knowledge and
whenever issues occur they try to resolve it before making strategic planning.
The issues which are common and faced by many organizations are given below:

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a) Organizational Structure- Structure of the organization is not so well that it

achieve its goals. According the changing trends of the market the organization
doesnt change itself.
b) Leadership- Leadership doesnt have ability to cover all his responsibilities and do
not resolve most of issues in time. The decisions they make may not in the favor
of business.
c) Governance- Stakeholders and governance of business and the employees are
greatly affected by the poor or bad leadership.
d) Lack of accountability-If the process of accountability is not good in the firm then
there will be no progress if the top management is not accountable then obviously
the lower management will also not be accountable so to make a better strategy
accountability is most important.
3) Lack of Focus
For a better business the focus should be clear. The main focus is what is our business
is and in which part of market we have to approach. Strategy and limited framework
can expand any business. By seeing all the opportunities in the market the business
will expand itself according to approach. Focus should be on business and everyone
linked with business should understand all its work and techniques properly and
crucial issue in developing a strategy is lack of focus (Houston, 2013).
The team members dont implement the strategy which is formed due to lack of the
focus. And mostly the strategy is not formed in the written form it is the worst
condition and most of the basic point of strategy are get ignored during its
implementation and it lead toward the failure of the business strategy.

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Activity 2
Audit and Analysis
Stakeholder analysis contains identifying the organizations process. To which stakeholder
you belong and what are the wants requirements and interests and searching the way how
these wants and interests influence our organization. By the analysis of the above things help
us to design a strategy which is in the favor of stakeholders, firm, employees and all the
persons who are connected with the firm like supplier, customers and creditors etc. the ideas
of stakeholder can merge with the business strategy in this way more goals can be achieved
and visions of the organization can be made more clear. In achieving a better business
strategy there should be dialogues with the main stakeholders (Robert, 1992).

Effectiveness: Effectiveness in audit tells us to what extent deviation from strategy is done
and our progress is near the actual goals or not.

Efficiency: Efficiency tells us the progress of the firm. It tells whether the progress is done
in best way or not and is it up to the mark or we need changes in it. It is checked by seeing
the inputs and outputs results of the services and product.

Economy: By audit it can be checked whether the resources are used properly or not. It
also tells us whether the ways used were economical or not. What were the main efforts?

Planning- In this phase of audit the organization develop a standard according to which the
audit is to be carried out. Standard performance strategy and audit framework is formed. The
performance of the organization is checked against this standard. Government rules,
international standards or guideline rules may influence this standard.

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Fieldwork- Information collected by the audit team is according to the audit criteria and
proper procedure. This can be done by doing surveys and reading existing files and data and
also by doing questioning to the people inside the organization.

Reporting-The report made at the end of the audit should be fair and true about the
organization. Suggestions and improvements which are required should be discussed with the
management and stakeholders to resolve the issues.

Activity 3
Evaluation and Selection:
The selection and analysis of the strategy enables the firm to achieve the goals by various
actions. Mostly alternative objectives are generated by the firm. And the strategy made is
evaluated by the firm in order to check whether the goals of the organization are achieved or
not.
During making and selection of the strategy all possible and feasible alternatives should be
kept in mind and it should be decided whether we will select the alternative or not or it is
practically possible or not. As the alternatives are large in number so we shall select those
alternatives which are more attractive and feasible for our business. The entire person should
have complete information of external and internal audit results who are involved in making
the strategy. All the team collectively takes decisions to select the alternatives which are
present (Houston, 2013).
Different strategy evaluation criteria are used to explain it, different type o test should be
organize to check the consistency, competence, frame and workability. We can evaluate
different alternative strategies, for this we use grand strategy matrix. Horizontal integration
strategy is used by the firm which has many resources. Aggressive risk are taken by those
firms which have competitive position and substantive growth.
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The explosive and rapid changes are required in the form where slow or limited growth and
position of competitive is also weak. For this we need different alternatives which can bring
these changes. In this way we can save firm from further loss or decline. Firm should reduce
its assets and also its cost which is increased extensively. Retrenchment strategy should be
adopted by the firm in this scenario. Diversification in the product of the firm also needed
and it is also a alternative at this stage to avoid risks. If no policy and no alternative works at
this stage then there is one last option which is liquidation.
Those firms can diversify and invest in different avenues which have strong competitive
position and limited growth. Joint venture are made at this stage in order achieve high
growth. If we evaluate the McDonalds business strategy as its growth is substantive and it is a
strong competitive firm so McDonald should increase its product line and also penetrate in
market to get more profit.

Activity 4
Implementation
The practical action of the strategy which is being formulated is called strategy
implementation. Strategy formulation is a step forward of the strategy implementation. In
strategy implementation different actions is to be done in order to put the strategy in practical
action. For doing this new employees are to be hired and new department is to be establishing
in the firm. Different strategies of the firm are to be changed like financial budget and pricing
strategy are changed. New employees are hired, new managers are appointed and new
facilities are given. All this could take some sufficient time and effort.
Annual objectives are formed during the implementation of the strategy by the manager of
the firm. These annual objective involves the correction of the actions of employees and also
comparing with the performance standard. Solution of the problems should be made for those
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problems which arise during the implementation of strategy. The policies which are made
should be applicable to all managers and employees of the firm. Allocation of the resources is
also very important in the strategy implementation. These resources are of many kinds they
can be human, technological, physical and also financial. One of most important resource in
strategy implementation is time. New managers and employees are also needed (Benson,
2004).

Conclusion

Research Project

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A lot of budget, energy and time are required for the implementation of the strategic planning.
Many resources are used in the most of the firms many people and lots of money around
$30,000 to $80,000 is required for the implementation of the strategy. So the maximum
advantage of the strategy can be achieved if it is implemented in correct and accurate way.

References

Bernardin, Z., (2004). Human Resource Management 4E. Tata McGraw-Hill

Education.

Benson, R. (2004). From Business Strategy to IT Action: Right Decisions for a Better
Bottom Line. John Wiley & Sons.

Ferrel, J. (2009). Business Ethics 2009 Update: Ethical Decision Making and Cases.
Cengage Learning.

Hitt, M., Hoskisson, R. (2008). Understanding Business Strategy: Concepts and

Cases. Cengage Learning.

Houston, B. (2013). Business Strategy. Routledge.

Konrath, F. (2002). Auditing: a risk analysis approach, Volume 1. South-Western.

Lorat, N. (2009). Market Audit and Analysis. GRIN Verlag.

Robert, B. (1992). Business Strategy for Sustainable Development: Leadership and

Accountability for the 90's. DIANE Publishing.

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Schmidt, K. (1995) The Quest for Corporate Identity. London: Cassell

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