Strategy formulation as an activity include identifying opportunities & threats in the organization’s environment & attaching some estimates or risk factor to the discernible alternatives.
Before a choice can be made,the organization’s strength & weaknesses should be appraised together with the resources on hand & available.
The strategic alternative which result from matching opportunity & corporate capability at acceptable level of risks is what is called ECONOMIC STRATEGY.
Most companies are either economic or myopic in terms of truth when performing their SWOT or PESTEL analysis for reasons best known to them. This is a major factor that leads to failure of most strategic plans for SME’s
To enable success in your strategic planning, you need to :
1-Undertake a pragmatic and sensible critical question analysis.
2-Be aware that strategic planning is not a one off project but a continuous process of ensuring your organization is adapting to environmental changes
3-Undertake strategic control that solely focuses on monitoring & evaluating the strategic management process in order to improve it & ensure that it is functioning properly.
Its therefore paramount that entrepreneurs, managers, BOD etc understand two critical aspects of post strategic plans ;
a). The importance of strategic control & strategic audits (assessment of organizational environment)
b). The importance of information systems and how much such systems can compliment the strategic control process.
Many organizations have developed strategic plans that gather dust on shelves. As the saying goes a kingdom is lost just by the loss of a horse shoe nail .