Strategic Management Plan

Students will write a 4,000-word essay based on the material covered in class. The objective is to describe, evaluate, and recommend a strategic management plan to an organization.

• Use concepts, theories and frameworks from the course with the support of relevant literature to debate the effectiveness of this plan.

• While the paper should clearly be linked to materials touched on in class, I am open as to the specific organization but you should write the essay on an organization and industry that you are passionate about –perhaps one in which you want to work!

• In all cases, material used should be fully referenced and sources acknowledged.
Components

• Describe and Evaluate -Strategy frameworks to be used: – Company Introduction: Vision/Mission Statement plus five-year financial results (or proxy) – External analysis

• PESTEL

• Five Forces – Internal analysis

• VRIO

• Generic Strategies – SWOT – One or two more framework depending on company (e.g., corporate strategy, international strategy)

• Recommendations
Mission statements
Amission statementaimsto provide employees and stakeholders with clarity about what the organisation is fundamentally there to do.

• ‘What business are we in?’

• ‘What would be lost if the organisation did not exist?’

• ‘How do we make a difference?’
The PESTEL framework categorises environmental factors into six key types: Political Economic Social Technological Ecological Legal
PESTEL helps to provide a list of potentially important issues influencing strategy. It is important to assess the impact of each factor.