STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT

Strategic Management

[Institution's Name]

Strategic Management

Introduction

The paper focuses on the two particular challenges that are faced by all strategists today. First challenge is to decide whether the process should be more an art or a science. The second one is to decide whether strategies should be visible or hidden from the stakeholders. These are basically twenty first century challenges in Strategic Management. Further it explains the most important concepts that I have learned in this course.

Strategic Management can be defined as an ongoing process that analyses the particular industry where a company is involved; analyses the competitors and accordingly formulates the strategies and sets goals to meet all the competitors. Strategic Management assesses the company's position with regards to its competitors. It keeps re-assessing the strategies on a regular basis, either annually or half yearly, depending upon the changes in the industry. It determines if the strategies have been implemented and succeeded, as it was required, or it needs a replacement by new ideas and new strategies to meet new economic environment (Lamb, 1984).

Discussion

Art or Science

It is one of challenges of twenty first century faced by the strategists to decide if Strategic management is more of an Art or Science. The long held debate has various aspects and reasons to justify its decision. In recent years, the subject has gained great importance. In my opinion, the Strategic Management is balanced and composed of both Art and Science. It is defined as the art and science of formulating, implementing and evaluating cross-functional decisions that enable an organization to achieve its objective (Joyce and Woods, 2001).

Like other practices, such as medicine or law, managing is an art. To strategically manage and formulate strategies, managers must not only have the necessary abilities to manage but also critical skills to analyze the situation. These skills are ...