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ALLAMA IQBAL OPEN UNIVERSITY ISLAMABAD
(Department of Business Administration)
Commonwealth of Learning Executive MBA/MPA Programme
1. PLAGIARISM OR HIRING OF GHOST WRITER(S) FOR SOLVING THE ASSIGNMENT(S) WILL DEBAR THE STUDENT FROM AWARD OF DEGREE/CERTIFICATE, IF FOUND AT ANY STAGE.
2. SUBMITTING ASSIGNMENTS BORROWED OR STOLEN FROM OTHER(S) AS ONE’S OWN WILL BE PENALIZED AS DEFINED IN “AIOU PLAGIARISM POLICY”.
Instructions:
(a) All written assignment must be well organized, presented in an easy-to-read format, and neat. If your handwriting is not legible, type or compose the written assignment. Moreover, pay particularly close attention to grammar, spelling punctuation and understandability. Communication is extremely important in this course.
(b) Documentation is likewise very important. Un-supported statements or opinions are worth less to the reader who desires to verify your finding. Complete and specific documentation is mandatory. Also, your references should be to primary sources, except in rare unusual situation.
(c) Quoting should be kept to an absolute minimum.
Course: Strategic Management (5574) Semester: Autumn 2010
Level Executive MBA/MPA Total Marks: 100
ASSIGNMENT No. 1
Q. 1 Strategy is a unified, comprehensive, and integrated plan that relates to the strategic advantages of the firm to the challenges of the environment. It is designed to ensure that the basic objectives of the enterprise are achieved through proper execution by the organization (Jaunch and Glueck, 1988). Comment on the statement? (20)
Q. 2 Discuss the strategy of your organization to define, establish and maintain performance levels? What factors in the environment stimulate or dampen down its way to achieve such performance levels? (20)
Q. 3 In your opinion, does your organization take a ‘specialist’ or a ‘generalist’ stance to position itself in strategic environment? What factors influence in shaping as ‘specialist’ or a ‘generalist’? (20)
Q. 4 Describe how a selected set of conditions will influence the strategic decision making process? (20)
Q. 5 How objectives (measurable points of attainment along the strategic pathways) are linked with mission statements and how do objectives relate to measures of overall organizational performance such as Key performance Indicators? (20)
ASSIGNMENT No. 2
Total Marks: 100
Instructions:
1. This assignment is a research-oriented activity. You are required to develop a term paper and submit to the tutor for evaluation prior to the final examination. The last date of this assignment will be notified separately by our directorate of regional services and the same will be communicated to you directly as well as through approved study centers assigned to you.
2. You will have to participate in the activity fully, actively and practically to be eligible to sit in the final examination of the course.
3. 3. For the preparation of this assignment, you should first thoroughly review the conceptual framework of the topic and develop a scholarly material of the same giving references, quotations, and extracts of various scholars and experts. Then visit any business/commercial organization and study the relevant practical aspects there. Combining the theoretical and practical aspects, develop a comprehensive paper consisting of at least 20 to 25 typed pages to be submitted to your tutor.
(a) Introduction of the topic
(b) Important sub-topics
(c) Practical study of the organization with respect to the topic
(d) Review of theoretical and practical situations merits, de-merits deficiencies or strengths of the organization with respect to the topic under study.
(e) Conclusions and recommendations
(f) Annex, if any
4. Prepare a copy of this assignment and submit to your tutor for your evaluation.
5. You should prepare the transparencies, charts, or any other illustrative material for effective presentation.
6. If you fail to present this assignment in the class, then you will not be able to sit in the final examination conducted by AIOU.
7. A number of topics given below are the general aspects of the course and you are required to select one of the topics according to the last digit of your roll number. For example, if the roll number is N-9337241, you will select topic number 1, and if the roll number is O-3427185 then you will select topic number 5 (the last digit).
1. External Environments and Organization to Boundary Relationships
2. Competitive Structure of the Industry
3. Critical Success Factor measurement
4. The organizational Life Cycle
5. Introduction to organizational Analysis
6. The ‘Inside to outside, Outside to inside’ perspective
7. Defining the Organizational Equation
8. The Generic approach to Strategy analysis
9. Contrasting Industry and Societal Environments
0. Formulating Mission Statements
STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT
Course Outline (5574)
Block-1 Introduction to Strategic Management
1 The Nature of Strategic Management
2 The Value of Strategic Management
3 Key Perspectives on Strategic Management
3.1 The Competitive Conditioning
3.2 Positioning
3.3 Conditioning
3.4 Organisational Fit and Stretch
3.5 Organisational Adaptability and Flexibility
3.6 Evolutionary Processes: Life Cycles, Strategy, and the Passage of Time
3.7 Strategy Integration: the Woods and the Trees
3.8 Strategy Integration and Resource Deployment
3.9 Organisational Capacity for Change
4 Strategy Formation
4.1 Strategy Models and Schools of Thought
4.2 An Overview of Prescriptive Views
4.2.1 The Design School
4.2.2 The Planning School
4.2.3 The Positioning School
4.3 An Overview of Process Views
4.3.1 The Entrepreneurial School
4.3.2 The Cognitive School
4.3.3 The Learning School
4.3.4 The Political School
4.3.5 The Cultural School
4.3.6 The Environmental School
4.3.7 The Configuration School
Block-2 Managing the Strategy Cycle
1 Introduction to Strategic Management and Planning Cycle
1.1 Defining Strategic Management and Planning Cycle
1.1.1 The Conditionals
1.1.2 The Data Base
1.1.3 Analyticals
1.1.4 Outputs and Outcomes
1.1.5 The Metrics
2 Managing the Strategy Setting Process
2.1 Strategy and Decision Making
2.2 The Integration of the Organisational ‘Vision’ with the ‘Self’ Vision
2.3 Strategy and Change
2.4 Strategy and Evolution
2.5 Strategy and the Planning Horizon
2.6 Planning Horizons
2.7 Planning Horizons
3 Planning and Performance
3.1 Goal Measurement
4 Formality and Planning
4.1 The ‘Practice’ of Strategic Management
5 The Role of Strategy Related Policies and Procedures
6 Organisational Levels and Strategic Planning Roles
6.1 Strategy Roles and Job Positioning
Block-3 The Strategy Equation
1 Introduction to Strategy Equation
1.1 Defining Strategy Equation
1.2 Mapping the Strategy Equation
2 The Mission
2.1 Examples of How Organisations Can Define Themselves
2.1.1 In terms of the products/services being provided
2.1.2 In terms of the dominant characteristic or principal ingredient in their products
2.1.3 In terms of the technology which spawns the product
2.1.4 In terms of the customer groups being served
2.1.5 In terms of a specific product/service aimed at a specific buyer segment
2.1.6 In terms of customer needs and wants being met
2.1.7 In terms of the scope of activities within an industry –specialised, each providing a defined type of service or function
2.1.8 In terms of creating a diversified enterprise which engages in a group of related businesses
2.1.9 In terms of creating a multi-industry portfolio of unrelated
3 Goals
4 Objectives
5 Policies
Block-4 The Strategy Landscape
1 Induction to Strategy Landscape
1.1 Defining “Strategy Landscape”
1.2 Mapping the Strategy Equation to the Environmental Landscape
1.3 Industrial Landscapes
2 The Environmental Landscape
2.1 Spheres of Influence
3 Contrasting Industry and Societal Environments
3.1 Industry
3.2 Societal
3.3 Sourcing Cycle
4 The Organisation and its Environment
4.1 The organisational life cycle and environmental linkages
4.2 Organisation-Environment Fit
4.3 Organisation-Environment Boundary
4.3.1 The Organisation and Rates of Environmental Change
4.3.2 The Industry Environment
4.3.3 The Societal Environment
4.3.4 Economic Conditions
4.3.5 Sociocultural-Demographic Trends
4.3.6 Technological Change
5 The Organisation in its External Environment
5.1 Stability
5.2 Certainty
5.3 Complexity
5.4 Homogeneity
6 External Environments and Organisation to Boundary Relationships
6.1 The Information Framework
6.2 Cause-Effect Relationships
6.3 Organisational Boundaries and Environmental Scanning
7 Additional Ways of Thinking about the Environment
7.1 Thinking of Organisation/Environment Relationships
7.2 Thinking in System Terms
Block-5 Organisational Analysis
1 Introduction to Organisational Analysis
2 The ‘Inside to Outside, Outside to Inside’ Perspective
3 Defining the Organisational Equation
3.1 From the Structural Perspective
4 The Process and Value Chains
4.1 Linking Outputs, Outcomes, and Organisations
4.2 Linking the Process Chain to the SWOT
4.3 Linking the Organisational Process Chain to Organisational Key Analysis
4.4 Linking the Process Chain to Critical Success Factors
4.5 Linking the Process Chain to Core Competencies
Block-6 Strategic Analysis and Choice
1 Introduction to Strategic Analysis
2 SWOT approaches to Strategy Analysis
2.1 Organisational Variables
2.2 Relational Analyses
2.3 SWOT as a Database of Analysis
2.4 Critical Success Factors
3 The Generic approach to Strategy Analysis
3.1 Generic Strategy in the Value Chain
4 The Stakeholder and Output/Outcome approach
5 Envisioning Strategy
Block-7 The Industry Environment
1 Introduction to the Industry Environment
2 The Life Cycle approach to Industry Analysis
2.1 The Product/Market Life Cycle
2.2 The Organisational Life Cycle
2.3 The Industry Life Cycle
2.3.1 Sunrise
2.3.2 Sunset
3 The Competitive Forces approach to Industry Analysis
4 The Patterns of Competitive Force in the Value Chain
5 Competitive Structure of the Industry
5.1 The players and the playing field
5.2 The shift from revenue growth to cost
6 Barriers to Entry
6.1 Economies of Scale
6.2 Product Differentiation
6.3 Capital Requirements
6.4 Access to and Control over Distribution Channels
6.5 Cost Disadvantages independent of scale
6.5.1 Proprietary product technology
6.5.2 Favourable access
6.5.3 Favourable location
6.5.4 Learning or experience
6.5.5 Government policy
7 Barriers to Exit
7.1 Specialised Assets
7.3 Strategic Interrelationships
7.4 Emotional Barriers
7.5 Government and Social Restrictions
7.6 Industry Analysis
Block-8 Strategy Implementation and Control Processes
1 Introduction Strategy Implementation and Control Processes
2 Financial Ratio Analysis
2.1 Performance Ratios
2.2 Cost Ratios
2.3 Efficiency Ratios
3 The Balanced Scorecard
4 Critical Success Factor Measurement
5 Key Theories
5.1 Agency Theory
5.2 Stewardship Theory
5.3 Principles of Corporate Governance
5.3.1 Protection of Shareholder Rights
5.3.2 Equitable Treatment
5.3.3 Stakeholder Rights
5.3.4 Timely and Accurate Disclosure
5.3.5 Strategic Guidance
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