Strategic Management

Strategic Management

Strategic Management Issues

Introduction

The objective of this paper is to critically analyse how organisational structure, management styles and culture at a firm like Wrightbus, which is a family run business in the public transportation industry, might impact on the company's strategic management. The paper then analyses the options available for Wrightbus to improve its foreign business and how it can enter new markets, by looking at its advantage points and possible opportunities. And lastly to give recommendations for improving the company's export activities in the United States.

Impact of organisational structure, management styles and culture on strategic management

Andrew (1998 pp.25-30) writes that corporate strategy is the pattern of decisions in a company that determines and revels its objectives, purposes and goals, produces the principle policies and plans for achieving those goals and defines the range of business the company is to pursue, the kind of economic and human contribution it intends to make to its shareholders, employees, customers, and communities. On the same lines Strategic management as defined by Meyer (1987 pp.36-35), is “processes by which managers understand organisational goals; examine the future threat to, and opportunities for, an organisation; identify strategies for dealing with these threats and opportunities; ensure organisational capabilities to implement these strategies; and continually monitor the entire process to provide direction and support for accomplishing the strategic management objectives”.

There are five task to strategic management (i) Developing a strategic vision and mission (ii) Setting objectives (iii) Creating a strategy (iv) Implementing and executing the strategy (v) Evaluating performance and initiating corrective adjustments (Mackechnie, 2008 pp.25-30). Most importantly to remember is that strategic management is a constantly ongoing process, unlike other processes in an organisation that happen only once or twice a year eg. Budget allocations. Because of the nature of this processes there is continues monitoring of the steps which helps in identifying and correcting any abnormal processes if they arise. Competent execution of a well conceived strategy is the best test of managerial excellence and a proven recipe for organisational success ( Mackechnie ,2008 pp.25-30) . Good strategy plus good strategy execution leads to good management. If managed properly with a clear vision, a company such as Wrightbus can have an influence on its external environment, and set the customer demands and needs.

Organisational Structure

The human resources function is an essential component to of organizational design(Aaker 1999 pp.25-30). Several studies have been conducted on the growing importance of human resources within the organizational. As the science behind human resources continues to grow, so does the area of responsibility that it incorporates. The science of redesigning jobs and fitting them to the individual employee is one field that is expanding rapidly(Aaker 1999 pp.25-30). The small business bible found that companies which do not have proper human resource departments suffer greatly from official disorder, and the lack of management in concerning office activities.

The organizational environment is the second factor considered when designing an organizational structure(Cervellon & Dube 2000 ...