Business Strategy

Embrace strategies for improving your business and reaching your organization's goals "I wholeheartedly agree with Patrick Stroh: Good leaders understand strategy and good strategists need to be good leaders. Make this book a strategic tool for improving your business strategy." — Harvey Mackay, author of the #1 New York Times bestsellerSwim With The Sharks Without Being Eaten Alive In today's fast-moving and competitive business environment, strong leadership, insightful strategy, and effective innovation are critical links to staying ahead of your competition. Getting your business house in order can often be complicated, but does it really have to be? How do you take MBA 101 lessons, great models, and exceptional concepts and put them into play in the real world? Business Strategy: Plan, Execute, Win! strives to answers these questions in an educational and entertaining format. Working as a Fortune 20 practitioner with C-level executives, author Patrick Stroh has a keen understanding of the role played by current day strategists. With 5 chapters following the format of "All I Ever Needed to Learn About Business Strategy I Learned..." At the Movies, On the Farm, On Shark Tank, On Hell's Kitchen, and From the Bible, readers will gain valuable strategic insight regardless of industry, business maturity, or current business turbulence and how to apply these insights based on the factors impacting their own business. Each chapter ends with a One Chapter Conclusion, Two Gold Nuggets the reader is to write down and Three Additional Resources/Tools for more information, offering a practical roadmap to simplifying your success.

The effectiveness of a good strategy well implemented determines a business' future success or failure. Yet history is full of strategic decisions, big and small, that were ill-conceived, poorly organized and consequently disastrous. This updated guide looks at the whole process of strategic decision-making, from vision, forecasting, and resource allocation, through to implementation and innovation. Strategy is about understanding where you are now, where you are heading and how you will get there. There is no room for timidity or confusion. Although the CEO and the board decide a company's overall direction, it is the managers at all levels of the organization who will determine how the vision can be transformed into action. In short, everyone is involved in strategy. But getting it right involves difficult choices: which customers to target, what products to offer, and the best way to keep costs low and service high. And constantly changing business conditions inevitably bring risks. Even after business strategy has been developed, a company must remain nimble and alert to change, and view strategy as an ongoing and evolving process. The message of this guide is simple: strategy matters, and getting it right is fundamental to business success.

``An exceptional tool for the challenges facing today's corporate planner. It should be read by every manager involved in planning and strategy.'' --Robert R. Lindberg Vice-President, Corporate Development Transamerica Corporation Shows managers how to anticipate market trends, threats, and opportunities, and how to develop strategies that can help their companies respond and grow. Thoroughly revised from the acclaimed 1984 edition, with over 50% new material, the 2nd edition emphasizes a market-responsive approach to creating strategies that any business manager can use to generate effective strategic options in today's constantly changing marketplace. New chapters cover external analysis, customer analysis, competitor analysis, and developing strategy in mature or stagnant markets, and there is expanded coverage of sustainable competitive advantages (SCA).

Good Strategy/Bad Strategy clarifies the muddled thinking underlying too many strategies and provides a clear way to create and implement a powerful action-oriented strategy for the real world. Developing and implementing a strategy is the central task of a leader. A good strategy is a specific and coherent response to—and approach for—overcoming the obstacles to progress. A good strategy works by harnessing and applying power where it will have the greatest effect. Yet, Rumelt shows that there has been a growing and unfortunate tendency to equate Mom-and-apple-pie values, fluffy packages of buzzwords, motivational slogans, and financial goals with “strategy.” In Good Strategy/Bad Strategy, he debunks these elements of “bad strategy” and awakens an understanding of the power of a “good strategy.” He introduces nine sources of power—ranging from using leverage to effectively focusing on growth—that are eye-opening yet pragmatic tools that can easily be put to work on Monday morning, and uses fascinating examples from business, nonprofit, and military affairs to bring its original and pragmatic ideas to life. The detailed examples range from Apple to General Motors, from the two Iraq wars to Afghanistan, from a small local market to Wal-Mart, from Nvidia to Silicon Graphics, from the Getty Trust to the Los Angeles Unified School District, from Cisco Systems to Paccar, and from Global Crossing to the 2007–08 financial crisis. Reflecting an astonishing grasp and integration of economics, finance, technology, history, and the brilliance and foibles of the human character, Good Strategy/Bad Strategy stems from Rumelt’s decades of digging beyond the superficial to address hard questions with honesty and integrity.

'Business Strategy: an introduction' is an accessible textbook that provides a straightforward guide for those with little or no knowledge of the subject. It presents complex issues and concepts in a clear and compact manner, so that readers gain a clear understanding of the topics addressed. The following features are included: * A comprehensive introduction to the subjects of business strategy and strategic management * Complex issues explained in a straightforward way for students new to this topic * Student friendly learning features throughout * Case studies of varying lengths with questions included for assignment and seminar work * A discussion of both traditional theory and the most recent research in the field This second edition features new and updated case studies as well as more depth having been added to the material in the book. New chapters on business ethics, types and levels of strategy, and how to use case studies have been incorporated. A range of pedagogical features such as learning objectives, review and discussion questions, chapter summaries and further reading are included in the text resulting in it being a user-friendly, definitive guide for those new to the subject. A web-based Tutor Resource Site accompanies the book.

Verbeke provides a new perspective on international business strategy by combining analytical rigour and true managerial insight on the functioning of large multinational enterprises (MNEs). With unique commentary on 48 seminal articles published in the Harvard Business Review, the Sloan Management Review and the California Management Review over the past three decades, Verbeke shows how these can be applied to real businesses engaged in international expansion programmes, especially as they venture into high-distance markets. The second edition has been thoroughly updated and features greater coverage of emerging markets with a new chapter and seven new cases. Suited for advanced undergraduates and graduate courses, students will benefit from updated case studies and improved learning features, including 'management takeaways', key lessons that can be applied to MNEs and a wide range of online resources.

PICTURE THIS: A BOLD NEW BUSINESS STRATEGY DRAWN FROM TODAY'S HOTTEST VISUAL TRENDS Scientific studies have shown that looking at pictures, drawings, and other graphics engage both sides of the brain--opening the "mind's eye" and business systems to new possibilities we might not otherwise see. Frustrated by lackluster approaches to strategy, companies are combining illustrations and color with business strategy with phenomenal success. If you want to go beyond drawing on the back of a napkin, this book shows you how. Picture Your Business Strategy will help you master the principles of "strategic illustration," a proven system for visualizing ideas. Pictures and strategy come to life in the board, conference, or meeting room quickly, easily, and brilliantly. With just a few markers and paper, you can: Use pictures to restructure, reorganize, and rethink your business plan Draw lines between people, processes, and productivity Create new business possibilities through pictures and idea sharing Chart your progress with benchmarks and goal lines Create a project activity map that allows you and your team to see the big picture--and make it succeed Packed with clever drawing tips and simple templates to help you unlock your creativity, this inspiring book gives you everything you need to start bringing your big ideas to life. Developed by Christine Chopyak at Alchemy: The Art of Transforming Business, the book provides a fresh new business model for developing specific "seeable" actions that can be measured, tracked, and cascaded into other priority areas. There are so many practical, purposeful ways to use drawings in your everyday work environment, you'll wonder why you never did it before. Most important, you and your team will learn how to turn strategic illustrations into real-world results. Whether you're a boardroom doodler, corporate cartoonist, or Picasso for fun and profit, Picture Your Business Strategy will help you draw your way to success. "With this approach, organizations can create a cohesive and authentic understanding among teams that ultimately leads to increased motivation and bottom-line results. Chris shows us that drawing isn't just for kids, it's for leaders looking for a competitive advantage." --Tamara Kleinberg, serial entrepreneur and founder of TheShuuk.com "A brilliant piece of work that brings together the finite world of words with the infinite possibilities of pictures, taking strategic thinking and collective wisdom to a whole new level and presenting a more colorful way of imagining/imaging the future." -- Sabina Spencer, business strategist and author of The Heart of Leadership

To increase revenue, improve customer experience, and develop higher-performing teams, it's time for leaders to stop looking for quick fixes to complex business problems and start building a culture of love. Yes, love. Anchored by Softway's own transformational journey, Love as a Business Strategy offers a new, people-first framework for achieving any business outcome-written by folks that aren't fans of run-of-the-mill business books. As a matter of fact, Love as a Business Strategy is so chock-full of real-world examples of mistakes, heartbreak, and redemption that it reads more like a juicy exposé than a business book. Love as a Business Strategy steers clear from piety and theoretical concepts and instead shares grounded stories of resilient people running a real business. A business, as you'll come to find out, that was on the brink of disaster before 'love' took hold. Love As A Business Strategy doesn't preach or mislead, rather it lays out the blueprints for better business outcomes-like better employee engagement, enhanced patient experiences, and increased efficiency-then walks you through it step-by-step. A better way of doing business is possible. The workplace revolution has arrived. Love as a Business Strategy will help you ditch the status quo, embrace humanity, and achieve lasting success.