INTRODUCTION
1.1 BACKGROUND OF STUDY
The spate of competition among organizations has necessitated the need for improved performance if they are to realize their corporate goals. The socio-political environment of businesses is also ever changing and thus imposes upon these entities the challenges of managing that change in order to sustain performance. Resources are limited, consumer demands are primarily directed by prices, and as such businesses and firms could not sell everything they produced. Little attention being paid to competitors and relative competitive strength of the business, mainly due to the perception of the environment as being relatively stale and simple. “During and after the oil crises of 1973, the world economy virtually collapsed with both inflation and stagnation at the same time, leading consumer demands to change to high quality good and services, which in turn led to fierce international competition. (Garth, Andrea & Podolny, 2001: 25). This trend in the socio-economic environment unfortunately continued into the 1980s where western corporations could only look as their Japanese counterparts proved capable of combining high performance in areas of productivity, timeline and quality with a high degree of motivation and commitment from their employees. These developments resulted in both technological and economic changes that were difficult to predict with common forecasting methods. Techniques to explain product/market cost behaviour and the dynamics of international business competition were developed and refined. One of such techniques for overcoming such problems posed by strategic changes is strategic management. Management researchers have maintained that at the heart of organizational performance and productivity are three determinants: Strategy, capacity and the environment. Strategy management harnesses these elements and thus provides organizations with a tool for managing and improving performance. Strategic management is simply a set of management decision and actions that determines the long-run performance of an organization that includes environmental scanning, strategy formulation, strategy implementation and evaluation and control. Wheelen and Hunger (2002) in Onodugo, (2002).
Strategic management is a process for developing and enacting plans to reach a long term goal that takes into account internal variable and external factors. It encompasses an integrated, future-oriented managerial perspective that is:
1. Outwardly focused
2. Forward thinking and
3. Performance based, (Kiggundu, 1996).
Strategic managers identify long-range targets, scan their operating environments, evaluate their organization’s structures and resources, match these to the challenges they face, identify stakeholders and build alliances, prioritize and plan actions, and make adjustments to fulfill and improve productivity/performance objectives overtime.
According to Brinkerhoff (1994), strategic management is characterized as looking out, looking in and looking ahead. “Looking out” means exploring beyond the boundaries of the organization to set feasible objectives, identify key stakeholders and build constituencies for change. “Looking in” implies critically assessing and strengthening the organization’s systems and structures for managing personnel, finances and other essential resources. Finally, “looking ahead” entails melding your strategy with structures and resources to reach your policy goals, while monitoring your progress and adjusting your approach as needed. Balancing strategic management outward, inward and forward looking functions helps you develop a vision and a strategy for where and how to move the organization forward. Balancing these different perspectives is the essence of managing strategically. (Brinkerhoff, 1994).
| Project details | Contents |
|---|---|
| Number of Pages | 126 pages |
| Chapter one | Introduction |
| Chapter two | Literature review |
| Chapter three | methodology |
| Chapter four | Data analysis |
| Chapter five | Summary,discussion & recommendations |
| Reference | Reference |
| Questionnaire | Questionnaire |
| Appendix | Appendix |
| Chapter summary | 1 to 5 chapters |
| Available document | PDF and MS-word format |
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