Strategic management

 or corporate strategy involves the formulation and implementation of the major goals and initiatives taken by a company's top management on behalf of owners, based on consideration of resources and an assessment of the internal and external environments in which the organization competes.


 * CONTENT : A - F, G - L , M - R , S - Z , See also , External links

Quotes

 * Quotes are arranged alphabetically by author

A - F

 * Corporate strategy is the pattern of major objectives, purposes, or goals and essential policies and plans for achieving those goals stated in such a way as to define what business the company is in or is to be in and the kind of company it is or is to be. In a changing world it is a way of expressing a persistent concept of the business so as to exclude some possible new activities and suggest entry into others.
 * Kenneth R. Andrews (1971), The concept of corporate strategy, p. 28


 * This theory maintains that the objectives of the firm should be derived by balancing the conflicting claims of the various 'stakeholders' in the firm: managers, workers, stockholders, suppliers, vendors. The firm has a responsibility to all of these and must configure its objectives so as to give each a measure of satisfaction. Profit which is a return on investment to the stockholder is one of such satisfactions, but does not receive special predominance in the objective structure,
 * Igor Ansoff, Corporate Strategy: an analytical approach to business policy for growth and expansion,  1965, p. 34


 * Strategy can be defined as the determination of the long-term goals and objectives of an enterprise, and the adoption of courses of action and the allocation of resources necessary for carrying out these goals
 * Alfred D. Chandler (1962) Strategy and Structure. p. 13.


 * Business strategy is the battleplan for a better future.
 * Patrick Dixon, Building a Better Business (2005)

G - L

 * Good mission statements focus on a limited number of goals, stress the company’s major policies and values, and define the company’s major competitive scopes. These include:
 * Industry scope: The industry or range of industries in which a company will operate. For example, DuPont operates in the industrial market... and 3M will go into almost any industry where it can make money.
 * Products and applications scope: The range of products and applications that a company will supply. St. Jude Medical aims to “serve physicians worldwide with high-quality products for cardiovascular care.”
 * Competence scope: The range of technological and other core competencies that a company will master and leverage. Japan’s NEC has built its core competencies in computing, communications, and components to support production of laptop computers, televisions, and other electronics items.
 * Market-segment scope: The type of market or customers a company will serve. For example, Porsche makes only expensive cars for the upscale market and licenses its name for high-quality accessories.
 * Vertical scope : The number of channel levels from raw material to final product and distribution in which a company will participate... [or] may outsource design, manufacture, marketing, and physical distribution.
 * Geographical scope: The range of regions or countries in which a company will operate. At one extreme are companies that operate in a specific city or state...
 * A company must redefine its mission if that mission has lost credibility or no longer defines an optimal course for the company
 * Philip Kotler (2001). Marketing Management, Millenium Edition, p. 41 ; Chapter 3. Corporate and Division Strategic Planning


 * Corporate strategy refers to the relationship between an enterprise and its environment. Strategy has two aspects. Strategic posture (or position) refers to an actual relationship between enterprise and environment at a specific point in time. Strategic plan refers to an intended future relationship; the plan consists of a set of corporate objectives and the proposed conditional action steps to be taken in order to reach those objectives.
 * Robert Lee Katz. Cases and Concepts in Corporate Strategy, Prentice-Hall, 1970, p. 195.

M - R

 * A fundamental part of any firm's corporate strategy is its choice of what portfolio of business to compete in. According to the academic literature, this decision should reflect the 'superiority' of related diversification over unrelated diversification... This is because related diversification presumably allows the corporate center to exploit the interrelationships that exist among its different businesses (SBUs) and so achieve cost and/or differentiation competitive advantages over its rivals.
 * Constantinos C. Markides and Peter J. Williamson. "Related diversification, core competences and corporate performance." Strategic Management Journal 15.S2 (1994): p. 149


 * Without competitors there would be no need for strategy, for the sole purpose of strategic planning is to enable the company to gain, as efficiently as possible, a sustainable edge over its competitors. Corporate strategy, thus, implies an attempt to alter a company's strength relative to that of its competitors in the most efficient way.
 * Kenichi Ohmae. (1982), The Mind Of The Strategist: The Art of Japanese Business. p. 36


 * Strategy is about stretching limited resources to fit ambitious aspirations.
 * C. K. Prahalad, cited in: Don Soderquist (2005), The Wal-Mart Way, p. 178