Strategic management is the process of specifying the organizations objectives, developing
policies and plans to achieve these objectives, and allocating resources to implement the
policies and plans to achieve the organizations objectives. It is the highest level of
managerial activity, usually formulated by the Board of directors and performed by the
organizations Chief Executive Officer (CEO) and executive team. Strategic management
provides overall direction to the enterprise and is closely related to the field of
Organization Studies.
Strategic management is an ongoing process that assesses the business and the industries in
which the company is involved; assesses its competitors and sets goals and strategies to
meet all existing and potential competitors; and then reassesses each strategy annually or
quarterly [i.e. regularly] to determine how it has been implemented and whether it has
succeeded or needs replacement by a new strategy to meet changed circumstances, new
technology, new competitors, a new economic environment., or a new social, financial, or
political environment. (Lamb, 1984:ix)[1]
Strategic management is a combination of 1) strategy formulation and 2) strategy
implementation.
Strategy formulation involves:
* Performing a situation analysis, self-evaluation and competitor analysis: both internal
and external; both micro-environmental and macro-environmental.
* Concurrent with this assessment, objectives are set. This involves crafting vision
statements (long term view of a possible future), mission statements (the role that the
organization gives itself in society), overall corporate objectives (both financial and
strategic), strategic business unit objectives (both financial and strategic), and tactical
objectives.
* These objectives should, in the light of the situation analysis, suggest a strategic plan.
