Strategic Management Assignment – 02

Application Assignment No. 2

Theme: Implementation of Strategy; Remaking Strategy: Role of
Innovation in achieving CA
Q. What is the role of innovation with respect to the seven S’ within
your firm? Discuss whether or not the hard S’ are in alignment with
soft S’ of the firm.
Ans.
I am working in L&T Construction, let me brief you about the company first -
Brief introduction about Company: L&T Construction is India's largest
construction organization and ranked among the world's top 30 contractors.
There are various independent companies which are Building & Factories,
Transportation Infrastructure, Heavy civil Infra, Power transmission &
distribution, Renewable energy, water & effluent treatment and smart world and
communication. I am presently working in Power Transmission & Distribution IC
in BSNL NFS OFC Project. (Contact 1 MS Assignment 08, AnuragM_RollNo_17).
McKinsey 7S
Model:

Image Source: https://creately.com/blog/diagrams/mckinsey-7s-model-guide/

The Seven S are divided in two categories which are:

Hard S Soft S
Strategy Style

Name: Anurag Mishra Roll No. – PGEMP76/A/17

Batch – PGEMP 76 Subject: Strategic Management
Contact – 6 Assignment No. – 04
 Structure Staff
Systems Skills
Shared Values

The role of innovation with respect to McKinsey 7S Model is described below:

1. Strategy:
Strategy is plan devised by corporation to sustain competitive
advantage. It entails a series of choices and actions to be performed in
reaction to changes in the company's external environment, which
includes consumers and rivals. The various strategies which our firm
focuses on are related to profitability strategy which means to execute
the projects in such a way that we must gain profits from that and that
can be done by completion of projects on time with highest standard of
quality and safety. In this behalf, company has started awarding the
sites and employees which completing the projects on time and with
high standards of quality & safety.
The Management always focused towards improving the customer
service and for that the new strategy which company wanted to go
digital. For going digital our firm needs to take many steps towards
innovation.
2. Structure
The structure is organizational chart of company. It depicts how the
company's many units and divisions are organised, who reports to
whom, and how duties are divided and integrated. Our company
follows two types of structure which are functional and Matrix. As all
the supported function are having two lines of managers like a matrix
structure and the execution team is having only one line manger as
functional structure have.
3. Systems
These are the process and procedures of the company which reveal the
firm’s daily activities. The various systems which our firm uses are
Enterprise Information portal for finance and planning activities, My
Zone – Success factor portal for HR modules and Integrated
Management system is being used for Safety & Quality.
As the company is focused on the digitalization, the system change is
must for that, and our firm has come up with various applications for
monitoring the project site. For progress monitoring – Project
Name: Anurag Mishra Roll No. – PGEMP76/A/17
Batch – PGEMP 76 Subject: Strategic Management
Contact – 6 Assignment No. – 04
 Management Application is launched. For safety Monitoring at site –
Sheild Application is launched and for Quality Monitoring application is
launched. This helps in better monitoring of the project sites.
4. Style
Style refers to the leadership style of top management and overall
operating style of the firm. For a firm, down the line it is must that all
employees must be in line with the leadership thoughts, and they are
very much eager to achieve the objective. For interaction with
employees, Microsoft teams is being used and this is launched in the
firm recently.
5. Staffing
Staffing refers to the employee’s background, qualification, and
competencies. In our firm, L&T is always focused to recruit right
person for the right job. This is only possible if the competency of the
person is checked before recruitment and providing regular trainings
and opportunities. Here the role of innovation, company has recently
launched new business i.e., L&T Edutech, through which they are
approaching various colleges for providing the study material and, they
are providing our own employees opportunities for further study in the
reputed colleges of India. So, it is new innovative approach that firm
has taken for training and building more competent employees.
6. Skills
Skills refers to the core competency of the firm and for that firm
requires the distinctive competencies in their employees, management
process and technologies. L&T Construction PT&D IC is known for
construction of various substations, power plants, transmission line
laying, etc. but as the market is growing company must look forward
towards new market and for that L&T PT&D IC recently got into the
Optical fibre segment, which is future demand and seeing the future
prospect, employees’ skills are developed by providing various
trainings and gaining more projects in this segment.
7. Shared Values
The shared value is the link between the business opportunities,
corporate social responsibility and company assets and expertise.
The various core values of our firm are Integrity, Excellence, Customer
focus, Caring, Entrepreneurship, Innovation & Corporate social
responsibility.

Name: Anurag Mishra Roll No. – PGEMP76/A/17

Batch – PGEMP 76 Subject: Strategic Management
Contact – 6 Assignment No. – 04
 Image Source: https://medium.com/@impactdive/shared-values-a-key-driver-of-sustainability-9ac14d46cc95

This core values are derived from the vision statement of the L&T and
in shared values our firm looks after various innovations time to time
for achieving the vision.

Now, checking that the hard S are aligned with soft S of the organization:
So, for checking that, I will take one example to show the alignment of the
hard S and soft S.
Strategy: The company strategy is clear to go digital and to reduce the
carbon emission in the environment and this strategy can only be achieved,
if the paperwork and the other project works to be digitalized.
So, in this context company has changed its System like development of the
safety application which helps in reducing the paperwork and site safety can
be monitored in better way.
The Structure is also changed for the application, all site supervisors are
reporting to site engineers, site engineers reporting to site incharges and site
incharges are reporting to project managers. The observations raised
through shield application are routed to concerned site engineers and site
incharges. If the compliance not done within specific time, the observation
would automatically escalate to project managers and after that to cluster
heads and cluster EHSOs. This type of structure is followed.

How the above three hard S are aligned with the Soft S is given below:
Style:
The launch of application shows the commitment of the leaders in increasing
the digitalization in the firm. So, all the employees are given mails to
download the same and data of application downloads is being reviewed in
the management meetings.
Name: Anurag Mishra Roll No. – PGEMP76/A/17
Batch – PGEMP 76 Subject: Strategic Management
Contact – 6 Assignment No. – 04
Staff:
All the staffs are trained for using the application time to time. All the site
EHSOs are guided to provide the regular trainings to the site staffs for using
the application and creating the awareness in the site supervisors.
kills:
All the employees are given role as per their expertise in the application
which show skills are also aligned and weekly usage details like how many
pre-task plans being raised, how many are approved, how many
observations are recorded being monitored.
Shared Value:
The application is created in such a way that it would not harm the shared
value of the organization as per firm’s vision, L&T never compromise with the
safety. Therefore, the escalation matrix is being provided in the application,
if the observations are not closed timely by site team it would get escalate to
the top management and all the observations needs to be closed before that
point. So, all the employees are more devoted towards the site safety and
compliances.

So, the above example clearly shows that in our organization, hard S are
very much aligned with the soft S.
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Ref:
1. Assignment No. 08, Week 5, Marketing Strategy, Contact 1, 2020.
2. https://creately.com/blog/diagrams/mckinsey-7s-model-guide/
Accessed on 09.01.2021.
3. https://medium.com/@impactdive/shared-values-a-key-driver-of-
sustainability-9ac14d46cc95, Accessed on 09.01.2021

Name: Anurag Mishra Roll No. – PGEMP76/A/17

Batch – PGEMP 76 Subject: Strategic Management
Contact – 6 Assignment No. – 04