Corporate Strategy

by Thomas Sim, 10 Oct, 2000

Reading through some texts on corporate strategy, e.g. Exploring Corporate Strategy by Johnson & Scholes, it leaves me wonder how much of 'strategy' are we doing in our daily sales calls.

For the seasoned, the notion of following strategy is a nail on the wall, being there but not being used most of the time. This does not mean that we don't have a strategy, it may well seems that we have better strategy at times!

The understanding of corporate strategy can be just a simple sentence, i.e. "A course of action, including the specification of resources required, to achieve a specific objective" by BBP Text 1999, ICSA.

Strategy itself can be further divided. Corporate strategy, organizational strategy/business strategy or operational strategy are different levels of business decision making in an organization. For most of us, we are at the operational level, where in our 'layman's term', we call it 'Action Plan'.

The process of drafting a strategy for the success of the business is the study of strategic Management. Strategic management covers the entire cycle of planning and control, at a strategic level:

1. Strategic analysis
2. Strategic Planning, Choice of strategies
3. Implementation of strategies
4. Review and Control or monitoring and review

At this juncture, I would like to give an example of strategy and action plan.

To cut down road accident, the town traffic department may have a strategy. For instance, reduce speeding at blind junctions and catching ruthless drivers to cut down recurrance of accidents of similar nature may well be the strategy.

The action or tactic may be a hidden camera installed at the traffic junction to effectively carry out the strategy

However, in the board room, there seems to be a massive confusion of what is what!