"Strategy is the direction and scope of an organisation over the long-term: which achieves advantage for the organisation through its configuration of resources within a challenging environment, to meet the needs of markets and to fulfil stakeholder expectations".
Strategy at Different Levels of a Business
Strategies exist at several levels in any organisation - ranging from the overall business (or group of businesses) through to individuals working in it.
Corporate Strategy - is concerned with the overall purpose and scope of the business to meet stakeholder expectations. This is a crucial level since it is heavily influenced by investors in the business and acts to guide strategic decision-making throughout the business. Corporate strategy is often stated explicitly in a "mission statement".
Business Unit Strategy - is concerned more with how a business competes successfully in a particular market. It concerns strategic decisions about choice of products, meeting needs of customers, gaining advantage over competitors, exploiting or creating new opportunities etc.
Operational Strategy - is concerned with how each part of the business is organised to deliver the corporate and business-unit level strategic direction. Operational strategy therefore focuses on issues of resources, processes, people etc.
How Strategy is Managed - Strategic Management
In its broadest sense, strategic management is about taking "strategic decisions" - decisions that answer the questions above.
In practice, a thorough strategic management process has three main components, shown in the figure below:
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