GSB004 Managing, Developing and Implementing Strategy

Task:

Learning Outcomes

Following successful completion of this course, participants will be able to:

1. Identify, analyse and discuss the important business challenges confronting managers and leaders

2. Interpret these challenges in the context of strategic management and the business objectives and strategic options they represent

3. Critically analyse the effectiveness and sustainability of an organisation’s current strategy, and where performance gaps exist

4. Identify the skills and resources needed to fill performance gaps, and achieve strategic goals while mitigating risk

5. Use and evaluate monitoring and control processes to measure the progress of the strategy as it is implemented

6. Develop, articulate and present competitive business strategies and visions

7. Effectively apply critical thinking skills to resolve problems independently and ethically while drawing on credible sources of information and data

Task description

You are required to produce a report on your Current Situation Analysis.

The objective of this assessment task is to demonstrate that you understand how to analyse an organisation’s external environment and internal environment, as well as identify to what extent the organisation is achieving its strategic goals and other performance objectives, and the implications of same. This assessment tasks also allows you to demonstrate your report writing skills for managerial decision-making.

The assessment task should be approached from the perspective of your current organisation or, with permission from your facilitator, from the perspective of an organisation that is prominent in Australia or with which you are familiar (e.g. an organisation where you have previously worked). 

You are required to address the following:

1. Introduce the report by introducing your organisation and its industry*, including the size of the industry, ‘membership’ or nature of the strategic groups operating in the industry and other relevant characteristics. 

2. Conduct an external analysis of its macroenvironment and its industry environment using the tools and techniques of external analysis introduced in class and the set text. Your report should make clear whether you are focussing on the whole organisation, or a department, division or a strategic business unit (SBU), and whether the organisation is commercial, government or not-for-profit. Your report should make clear which political, economic, legal, technological, environmental and legal factors, including issues, events, trends have the most capacity to impact the organisation and its industry. Likewise, your report should make clear which industry forces have the most capacity to impact the organisation and the future profitability and growth of its industry. The body of your report should explain the most important aspects of your analysis and their implications. Details of the analysis should be placed in appendices.

3. Explain the key success factors in the industry and to what extent the industry is dominated by a particular organisation or group. Make sure you explain the basis of your argument(s).

4. Conduct an internal analysis of the organisation with the view to identify if the organisation has all the resources it needs, including whether it needs to develop some or invest in new capabilities in some way. You should demonstrate that you are familiar with resourcebased view principles.

5. Explain the competitive business (corporate) strategy of the organisation or, if it is a multibusiness organisation, the business strategy of the department, division or SBU. You should

also establish if the strategy is wholly deliberate (planned) or emergent or a combination of the two.

6. Explain the overall performance of the organisation/division/SBU/division over the years and, certainly, over the last two years. Discuss the likely reasons for that performance, making clear which sources of evidence you used to come to this conclusion. Likewise, explain whether you believe the strategy has been approached across the organisation in an aligned manner and whether it adequately reflects the organisation’s current vision statement, that is, if one is in place. 

7. Using the ESC framework from the text as a guide, clarify whether there is evidence that the performance to date, particularly in the last two years is acceptable to stakeholders. This also means you need to make clear who are the organisation’s most important stakeholders, and why. 

8. Explain the nature of the customer base and whether it is likely to change some time in the foreseeable future. 

9. Clarify the direction in which stakeholders are likely to drive the strategy, including what it is that they currently seek from the organisation and are likely to want from it in the future.

10. Conclude by summarising your findings. The conculsion should also highlight what you believe are the most important trends and key success factors that could impact your organisation and its industry, as well as if there are external and internal inconsistencies or strategic gaps the organisation needs to address in the future. Gaps can be discussed in negative but also in opportunity terms. Your conclusion should tie all your arguments together so that they are clear to the reader. You should also explain the significance and/or implications of your findings for the future. This may include establishing whether the evidence suggests the organisation needs to change direction in some way.