The Task Your task is to produce a management report providing Strategic recommendations for your organization The recommendations should be based on thorough analysis and should involve critical evaluation of a range of potential solutions. The emphasis must be aiming to achieve competitive advantage. The choice of the final strategic decision should be justified. The recommendations must not be descriptive of what the organisation is actually doing but analytical and proposing what it could and should do. This may be different to the actual decisions made by your organisation. It may however be a justification of what is actually proposed by the organisation but must justify it in the light of other options and through analysis. Which approach you take depends on the circumstances of your organisation. Important Note: As Masters Students and senior business people you should look critically at your organisation. This is not disrespectful but a way of developing your business skills (which is the point of the Exec MBA). You should not therefore merely accept that what is being done is the only potential option. You should look at it from a critical perspective and think if there are different or better options. In business this approach forms part of a healthy discussion which leads the company forward. Some advice about approaching your research and investigation: The nature of Strategic Recommendations and decisions : • Your development of options and selection of the strategic decision must be strategic in nature • Success depends on you being able to understand the difference between operational and strategic issues and actions Below are some examples of the sorts of issues that might be investigated. Please note that this is not a complete list and that different ones may be relevant. (Generally you would only focus on one but there may be more that you could consider). The emphasis on the options that are considered should be on achieving competitive advantage: • Decision about which markets to enter • Decisions about potential product or service development • Decisions about which business units to invest in and grow and which to reduce • Growing a new business • Finding a new source of differentiation in the face of competitive pressure • Finding innovative ways to compete hence avoiding competition • Decisions about trade-offs • Decisions about continuing on the current strategic path path The Analysis: The analysis is vital for you to be able to create a range of strategic options and to justify a choice for the strategic decision – it is NOT however the report (the report is the discussion of the options and the justification for the choice) The analysis should be based on extensive study and use of data. The analysis must appear in your appendices. It is not necessary to do this in full report form but should be in the form of a series of annexes which will contain your notes. These must identifiably be your own work and will also be examined through Turnitin (by the UK tutors). The analysis and appendices must be referred to in your report as evidence and justification for your options and decisions. Things to avoid: • Descriptions of the tools and frameworks. You are not writing a text book and you will be assessed on your ability to think strategically rather than providing a lit review. This style of writing will lead to a low grade or failure. • Inappropriate referencing. Any evidence must be properly referenced within the text of the main report. • Out of date evidence. Business moves quickly, so a report that uses old data is not valid. • Descriptions of the current situation. This assignment must look at future potential options. • Focusing on operational issues. This is a strategy report and should focus on strategic issues and solutions. Words limit is 4000 Reference should not less than 16 Not older than 2010 Mostly from books and journals less from websites.
