MEGREY’STRATEGIC

MANAGEMENT

MODULE 5
Corporate Strategies
into Action
 STRATEGIES INTO ACTION
• actions in order to meet short and long-term goals, get an idea of
what the total investment needs to be in order to support
each action and measure the return on investment,
prioritize actions within each portfolio and reallocate
resources to those with the greatest
impact on achieving strategic goals while deferring .
TYPES OF STRATEGY
Characteristics/Features of Strategic Decisions

• Characteristics/Features of Strategic Decisions

• Strategic decisions have major resource propositions for
an organization. ...
• Strategic decisions deal with harmonizing organizational resource
capabilities with the threats and opportunities.
• Strategic decisions deal with the range of organizational activities.
What are the key characteristics of
effective strategic initiatives
• What are the key characteristics of effective strategic initiatives?
• For many organizations, the process of determining which initiatives
are strategic and which are operational can be challenging.  In order
to clarify the differences between these two types of projects, it is
critical that an organization go through a process of defining basic
information for all ongoing and proposed initiatives.  In this post, I’ll
try to highlight some of the key markers of an
effective strategic initiative.
• Strategic Initiatives focus on change
• The Balanced Scorecard can be broken down into four basic
components: Perspectives, Objectives, Measures (also known as
“KPIs” in some organizations), and Initiatives.  Objectives state a
clearly defined direction or outcome for an organization.  An example
of a Learning and Growth Objective might say something like, “Align
Incentives and Rewards with Employee Roles for Increased Employee
Satisfaction.” 
• While objectives tend to be broad, initiatives tend to more specifically
outline how you are going to accomplish an objective.  If an objective
is where you are going, then the initiative is how you are going to get
there. 
• This is where many organizations fall into the trap of confusing
operations with strategy.  Operations represent your day-to-day
performance.  Operations preserve value.  Strategy is all about
increasing value.  Operational initiatives tend to be ongoing processes
that remain fairly static.
• Strategic initiatives, on the other hand, focus on change.  A strategic
initiative should add a new process or modify an existing process. 
• .  A good initiative aligned to the example objective above might be,
“Implement Cloud-based Performance Appraisal and Rewards
System.”  Notice how the initiative isn’t an existing process.  It is a
new project that the organization is going to embark on to align
employee incentives and increase employee satisfaction.  The logic
behind how this initiative supports the objective may seem intuitive,
but it should regardless be clearly expressed in the initiative
definition.
• Strategic Initiatives have a defined scope
• Once a process has been stabilized, it becomes operationalized and
can be removed from the scorecard.  The concept of removing an
initiative from a scorecard is important because it highlights another
key characteristic of effective strategic initiatives: the scope.
• The scope encompasses many aspects of the initiative such as clearly
defined deliverables and outcomes, but it also touches on timelines. 
Each strategic initiative you create should include clear start and end
dates.  A strategic initiative’s duration can range from a couple of
months to a couple of years.  If the duration is less than a couple of
months, then the scope is unlikely to be strategic.  If the project is
longer than a couple of years, then it is worth asking if one initiative
might be more effectively broken down into two or three.  By
including dates, you put a stake in the ground related to providing a
specific deliverable.
• Including dates also has a profound impact on the conversation
 surrounding initiatives.  Which resources do we need in order to
accomplish this project on time?  Is this a realistic estimate for
accomplishing this goal?
• Strategic initiatives with defined objective linkages, scopes,
descriptions, dates, and deliverables are an excellent start to clearly
understanding your strategic project.  The full picture of the initiative
is fleshed out by also incorporating key milestone/task dates. 
• Milestones and tasks should outline the top 4-10 deadlines within the
scope of an overall initiative.  The number of milestones/tasks will
largely depend on the size and complexity of your strategic initiative. 
A three month project managed by one person might only need a
couple of high-level milestones.  A two year strategic initiative that
encompasses multiple teams and departments should be summarized
into 8-10 milestones.
• Clearly defining your strategic initiatives with all of the suggested
information is essential for the next steps in your strategy design,
especially as you align initiatives with objectives, then prioritize
initiatives based on need, resource restraints, etc.
•REFERENCES:
• Strategic Decisions - Definition and Characteristics
• www.managementstudyguide.com › strategic-decisions
• Key Characteristics of an Effective Business Strategy
• ugn.com › key-characteristics-of-an-effective-business-str..