The Secrets of Strategic Management

Today's market is replete with strategic management books offering different prescriptions for optimizing profitability of business firms. Therefore, it is only fair to inform potential readers about the difference between this book and its numerous competitiors.

Each of the competing books offers a success prescription, which is different from all others and claims to optimize profitability of all firms. Use of these solutions in business firms optimizes profitability in some firms and fails to do so in others. Typically authors of the respective prescriptions do not explain the reasons for the failures and successes.

This book differs from its competitors' in the following ways:

• It is based on a Strategic Success Formula (SSF) that has been validated in over 1,500 organizations/Strategic Business Units (SBUs) in 8 countries during 20 years of field research.
• It has been successfully applied to SBUs and organizations.
• The Strategic Success Formula states that firms succeed when their external strategy and internal capability are both aligned with the turbulence in the firm's environment.
• This Formula enables managers to diagnose their firm's readiness to succeed in the future and to develop and implement plans which will optimize their firm's profitability.

The Target Audience

This book is addressed to a group of readers who want to improve their knowledge of profit optimization in the turbulent environment of the 21st century and beyond.

This group includes:

• CEOs, corporate officers and managers involved in optimizing the profitability of their firms,
• Members of Boards of Directors,
• Thoughtful investors, and
• Students of Strategic Management who want to understand Strategic Management in highly turbulent environments.
  

• Why You Should Read This Book
• The Target Audience
• Caution to Readers & Sample of Key Topics

1. Competing Strageies for Profitability
1. Historical Development
2. Dynamics of the Business Firm
3. Prescriptions for Strategic Success
4. Strategic Planning Experience
2. Evolutiuon of Environmental Turbulence
1. The Mass Production Era
2. The Post-Industrial Era
3. Business Success Strategies During the Post-Industrial Era
1. Five Success Strategies
4. Eliminating Strategic Myopia
1. The Concept of Strategic Myopia
2. Eliminating Strategic Myopia
3. Ideal Profile of CEO
4. Profile of Candidates Requiring Training for CEO Position
5. Profile of Unacceptable CEO
6. Leading a Firm in a Turbulent Environment
5. Shift from Extrapolation of the Past to Focus on the Turbulent Future
1. Transforming the Organization
2. Walk the Talk
3. Restructuring Strategic Management to Face the Future
4. From an "Inside Out" to an "Outside In" Shift
5. Strategic Business Areas (SBAs) and Strategic Business Units (SBUs)
6. Strategic Segmentation
   
6. Strategic Suceess Paradigm
1. Setting the Stage — Introducing the Players
2. Environmental Turbulence
3. Organization's Strategic Response
4. Strategic Aggressivness — Strategy
5. Organizational Responsiveness — Capability
6. Strategic Diagnosis
7. How Does Strategic Diagnosis Work?
8. Validation of the Paradigm
9. Universality of the Paradigm
7. Management Capability
1. Concepts of General Management Capability
2. General Managers Capability: Motivation and Competence
3. Management Organization Capability: Climate, Competence and Capacity
4. Designing General Management Capability
8. Strategic Response at the Business Unit Level
1. A Brief Review
2. Evolution of Strategic Positioning Response
3. Evolution of Real Time Strategic Responses
4. Long Range Planning: Business Level Strategy at Turbulence Levels 1—3
5. The Original Concept of Strategic Planning
6. Strategic Posture Planning: Business Level Strategy at Turbulence Levels 4—5
7. Competitive Position
8. Competitive Posture Planning (Portfolio Posture)
9. Strategic Response at the Corporate Level
1. Managing Strategic Portfolios
2. Portfolio Optimization
3. Management Vision
4. Corporate Goals and Objectives
5. Tradeoffs Among Goals
6. Portfolio Strategy
7. Portfolio Optimization Strategy
10. Real Time Responses
1. Strategic Issue Management
2. Weak Signals and Graduating Responses
3. Strategic Surprise Management
4. Choosing Strategic Responses for a Firm
11. Strategic Posture Implementation
1. Resistance to Change
2. Conflict of Strategic and Operating Work
3. Lack of Strategic Competence
4. Types of Resistance to Change
5. Managing Resistance — A Summary
6. Dynamics of Managing Resistance
7. Strategies for Change Management — The Accordion Method
8. The Intrapreneur
12. Strategic Management of Technology
1. Technology Challenges to General Management
2. Technology Variables Impact Strategy
3. Technological Myopia
4. The Role of General Management in Technological Innovation
5. The Role of General Managers in Assuring the Level of Competence of Their Firm's Technologists
6. Gaps Between General Managers and Technologists
7. The Role of General Managers in Directing Marketing and Production for Timely Introduction of New Products/Services to the Market
8. The Role of General Managers in Choosing a Firm's Technology Strategy
9. Integration of Technology in the Firm's Strategy

• Overview
• Appendices
1. Glossary
• References
• Studies Empirically Supporting The Findings
• ANSPLAN Product Line
• The Ansoff Institute
• OPEN Company

This book doesn't really give you a blueprint on how to succeed or fail. Nor does it tell you exactly how to handle stuff. But it explains in no uncertain terms, based on extensive research and experience, why strategies succeed or fail.

Invaluable. It should be standard reading at any decent MBA course.