Your strategic initiatives are constantly under fire due to the evolving nature of markets, technology, laws, and government. To ensure your strategy succeeds, it must remain flexible while confronting these shifting challenges. Agile Strategy Management: Techniques for Continuous Alignment and Improvement explains how to achieve this flexibility by building agility into the initiation, development, implementation, and governance of your strategic initiatives. The book details what it takes to initiate, develop, implement, and govern a healthy strategy that delivers the benefits expected by all stakeholders. It presents insights gained by the author’s organization over the last 25 years helping their clients achieve success with their strategic initiatives. Filled with real-world examples and case studies, it illustrates wide-ranging situations where the author’s company helped clients reach important business objectives. Readers can use the book to look up examples that describe the various ways to use agile methods and techniques for critical business functions, including: Scope definition of strategic initiatives Stakeholder identification Team building Project and program quality management Change management Procurement of resources Solution development, implementation, and quality management Strategy governance In this book, you will find guidelines that explain how to establish internal organizations for change and how to ensure these intermediate organizations stay motivated until final solution delivery. Presenting success stories as well as major blunders, the book can help you avoid many of the pitfalls that other organizations have experienced while governing their strategic initiatives.
In a world of rapid and unpredictable change, the problem with strategic planning is that if you follow your plan through to the end, you will get exactly what you used to want. What you need is a framework for planning and implementing a strategy that is agile enough to adapt to a dynamic environment but focused enough to deliver. That framework is the Dynamic Balanced Scorecard. The original Balanced Scorecard system has proven the most popular, successful and enduring framework for strategy execution over the last 25 years. Comprising a Strategy Map and a scorecard of KPIs, targets and initiatives, the framework helped organizations distil a strategy into actionable components and measure progress towards a strategic vision, while also implementing and monitoring the actions that drove change. However, for all its success, the Balanced Scorecard system now needs to evolve for the digital age. Until now, building the system, rolling it out enterprise-wide and adapting it to external changes has been a lengthy process. While the fundamental principles of the system are still sound and relevant, it needs to become nimbler and more responsive. The book provides a step-by-step guide to agile strategy management: from formulation to implementation to learning and adapting. For each of the steps, the book explains how Dynamic Balanced Scorecards, fit for the digital age, are built and deployed.
In a very real sense, Michael Lodato has been working on this handbook for over 45 years - starting in 1968 when, as a new CEO of a small consulting company, he attended a seminar on strategic planning at UCLA. The resulting strategy helped run the company but also served as the first template for his strategic planning methodology. Over the years, as a result of working on real issues, faced by him as an executive and client corporations, the template expanded to add tactical planning and features to handle changes in the business environments that may be coming or have already occurred, to quickly assess the impact of such changes on success, and to adapt to the new realities by making changes to its strategies, tactics and processes in time avoid bad results In short, he added agility to the template that is the substance of this handbook. This is not a text book or a book on strategic management theory. It is a step-by-step, here’s-how-to-do-it guide to achieving agile strategic management. All of this growth in the strategic management processes came, not as an academic activity. It is written for people who do, or aspire to do the work of strategic management. As you learn about the processes and read stories about how they have applied to a wide range of situations, think through how you might apply them to the situations, issues and opportunities you face. They are intended to help you unleash the talent that resides in your team and organization. The resulting methodology includes processes that guide all the work of strategic management at all levels: from strategic, through tactical, and down to individual action items in such a way that there is a strong interdependence among them.
This book provides a powerful insight into strategic portfolio management and its central role in the delivery of organisational strategy, maximisation of value creation, and efficient allocation of resources and capabilities to achieve organisational strategic objectives. The book makes a valuable contribution to the development of thinking on the translation of strategy into actionable work. Whether you are a senior manager building a high-performing strategic portfolio for your organisation or an academic searching for new perspectives on strategy execution through portfolio management, you will find great significance in this book. Twenty-eight chapters in four sections provide multiple perspectives on the topic, with in-depth guidance on organisational design for strategic portfolio management and covering all process, capability, and leadership aspects of strategic portfolio management. The book includes several detailed case studies for the effective deployment of strategic portfolios, bringing together theory and practice for strategic portfolio management. This book is particularly valuable for advanced undergraduate and postgraduate students of project and portfolio management, strategic management, and leadership who are looking to expand their knowledge within the multi-project environment. Highly practical and logical in its structure, it also shows project management professionals how to effectively manage their business portfolios and align this with their business strategy.
This major practical handbook bridges the gap between strategy and design, presenting a step-by-step design process with a strategic approach and extensive methods for innovation, strategy development, design methodology and problem solving. It is an effective guide to planning and implementing design projects to ensure strategic anchoring of the process and outcome. Built around a six-part phase structure that represents the design process, covering initial preparations and project briefing, research and analysis, targets and strategy, concept development, prototyping and modelling, production and delivery, it is a must-have resource for professionals and students. Readers can easily dip in and out of sections, using the phase structure as a navigation tool. Unlike other books on the market, Design and Strategy addresses the design process from the perspective of both the company and the designer. For businesses, it highlights the value of design as a strategic tool for positioning, competition and innovation. For the designer, it teaches how to create solutions that are strategically anchored and deliver successful outcomes for businesses, resulting in appreciative clients. It includes over 250 illustrations and diagrams, tables, and text boxes showing how to move through each stage with clear visualisation and explanation. This book encourages all designers in product design and manufacturing, service design, communication design, branding, and advertising, to think beyond shape and colour to see design through the lens of strategy, process and problem solving, and all business managers, innovators and developers, to see the value in strategic design outcomes.
This paper presents three real life case stories that show how weakly-established organizational structures and objectives make communication and people enter into conflict instead of working together to reach feasible and beneficial results from strategic initiatives. All the cases had well-defined scope settings that lead to management "go ahead" and attribution of vast budgets. All the same, they failed to deliver or entered into critical problems demanding complete process restructuring and revamped organizations. This paper outlines a set of established tools for stakeholder management, for teambuilding, and for bringing organizations in crisis back on track. This framework of tools and techniques used early in and throughout important strategic initiatives has been used to achieve beneficial business results fast, and without any conflict, using the "no excuse for failure principle," which aligns well with the Agile Manifesto. The conclusion is that all stakeholders must be identified as early as possible and must be treated in such a way that they are happy from initiation to close out of a strategic initiative.
Leaders of most firms today are painfully aware of how difficult it is to execute strategies effectively in their organizations. Industry research has well documented this reality, with the success needle barely moving over the past 20 years. Our intent in this book is to merge 'agile concepts' with strategy execution 'Best Practices' resulting in an easy to understand set of principles and techniques, organized in a meaningful, practical and quickly deployable Agile Strategy Execution Framework . This framework is presented through the eyes of organizations where it has been successfully used to drive improvements in how strategy gets executed. We expect this book to help leaders and strategy practitioners revolutionize their business models by becoming more agile in an aligned, accountable and responsive way. Our Agile Strategy Execution Framework is composed of six Dimensions and two Influencing Factors, which can be summarized as follows: Dimension #1 Detailed Plans and Metrics involves incorporating a systematic and disciplined approach that focuses on translating breakthrough organizational goals, objectives and strategies into specific functional area, team and individual plans and their associated metrics. Dimension #2 Align and Link means ensuring that strategic goals are aligned and linked to projects, programs, run-the-business activities and process improvement efforts both vertically and cross-functionally driving progress/actions at all organization levels. Dimension #3 Real-Time Updates involves institutionalizing a transparent Single Source of Truth online for all plan collaboration, engagement and reporting and then driving real-time plan updates based on day to day triggers, ensuring properly prioritized & scheduled work. Dimension #4 Cadence Decisions means ensuring proactive real-time resourcing, course correcting solution and backlog management decision-making processes. Dimension #5 Innovation Bets involves identifying and executing small opportunities to study, pilot or test new innovations that reflect current market conditions, new technology or other advances. Dimension #6 Refresh or Transform means formally reassessing core business assumptions, updating strategic plans and tactics, reviewing priorities, linkages and alignment and then pivoting as needed. Influencing Factor #1 The Culture Impacts Influencing Factor involves assessing formal vs. informal, and preached vs. practiced corporate culture. Leaders can then either use their culture as an enabling driver for managing change or if needed initiate processes to drive needed culture change. Influencing Factor #2 The Connected Governance Influencing Factor involves using leading edge digitization experiences to link leadership practices, employee engagement mechanisms and collaboration processes. Also shared are the details of an Agile Strategy Execution Maturity Model that can be used to help organizations assess their own progress in executing strategy with more agility on an evolving scale and ascertain where they would like to be in the future. The Agile Strategy Execution Framework can then be used to target improvement areas and provide guideposts and methods as to how to move up the agile strategy execution maturity curve. Also in the Appendix are a select number of techniques and templates that the authors have found useful to help jumpstart improvement efforts. In conclusion, what makes strategy execution agile is an ecosystem focused on alignment (both functional and cross-functional), accountability (through data-driven with team and individual buy-in and ownership) and responsiveness (to changing internal and external landscapes). In this way strategies and tactics can be continuously adapted, pivoted and realigned to meet execution performance expectations in an agile way.
Seamlessly blending academic rigour and practicality, this textbook provides an introduction to global business strategy. Assuming a born global perspective, Global Strategic Management is supported by ample pedagogical features, including numerous case studies and examples featuring both established multinationals and unknown SMEs from across the globe. The book takes an applied approach to global business strategy, emphasising functional parts of international business (managing marketing, operations, HR and finance). The text has been widely updated to incorporate the impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic, such as work from anywhere and deglobalization. New to this fifth edition is increased material on sustainability and corporate social responsibility, including discussion of climate change, NGOs and sustainable development goals. Subjects such as the impact of technology, cryptocurrency and global strategy in the digital space are discussed in more detail, while the conflict in Ukraine is also considered.
Agile in simple terms, means the ability to move easily and quickly. In the business circle, agility or agile strategy refers to an approach in product management wherein within the dynamic, fast-changing market place an innovative strategic approach is conducive for profit and success. Agile strategizing involves a method of planning wherein importance is given to big-picture thinking, extra customer focus, and swift learning and adaption to the changing market scenarios. Agile strategy focuses on gaining a competitive advantage mainly by capitalizing on fresh innovations. The concept of agile strategy describes an organization’s ability to stay flexible and fluid, by continuously changing as well as updating their operations through new innovations. Agile strategic approach enables and equips any organization to think and plan ahead of the market, quickly mobilizing itself, adapting to market shifts, filling capability gaps, capturing new revenue in advance of the competition, and finally creating new markets.
Think and act strategically every time In today's business environment, strategic planning stresses the importance of making decisions that will ensure an organization's ability to successfully respond to changes in the environment and plan for sustainable viability. Providing practical, field-tested techniques and a complete 6-phase plan, Strategic Planning Kit For Dummies shows you how to make strategy a habit for all organizations, no matter the size, type, or resource constraints. Strategic Planning Kit For Dummies is for companies of all types and sizes looking to build and sustain a competitive edge, set up an ongoing process for market assessment and trend analysis, and develop a vision for future growth. This revised edition includes: new and updated content on planning for both the short and the long-term; crucial information on succession planning; help preparing for the unexpected using scenario planning and agile strategy; strategies for implementing change and integrating strategic plans successfully by involving all staff members; and more. The supplementary CD lays out a comprehensive, 6-phase, step-by-step program, complete with downloadable spreadsheets, charts, checklists, video links, and more Provides value for any business or entrepreneur looking to improve efficiency, focus, and competitive edge Includes practical, field-tested techniques Strategic Planning Kit For Dummies gives today's business owners and upper-level management the tools and information they need to think and act strategically in order to more effectively weather current economic storms while planning for future growth.
Master's Thesis from the year 2014 in the subject Business economics - Business Management, Corporate Governance, grade: 1, Donau-Universitat Krems (Faculty of Business and Globalization; Department for Management and Economics), course: Danube Professional MBA; Area of Concentration: Strategic Management & Organizational Change, language: English, comment: passed with distinction FIBAA accredited, abstract: Strategic decision-making is a key task for every senior manager of any sized company. Strategic decisions are characterized by highly uncertain conditions. Managing this uncertainty and anticipating the future, is seen as key to success and the measure for being a successful manager. In the opposite direction, if firms fail to anticipate how the future will be, it is then often called "bad luck." However, if "failing to anticipate the future" were correlated with bad luck, this would mean that "anticipating the future right" should be directly linked with good luck. However, good luck is often ignored and seen as excellent management performance instead. To reduce the influence of luck, this master thesis deals with the different approaches on strategy-formation and decision-making, to identify to what extent they differ in their methodology on how they manage the uncertainty and how they try to get control over the future. The aim is to identify best practice approaches that should lead to better performance on reduced risk and cost.
