Confirming Pages

CHAPTER

2 Leading the Process of

Crafting and Executing
Strategy

LEARNING OBJECTIVES
1. Grasp why it is critical for company managers to think long and hard about where a
company needs to head and why.
2. Understand the importance of setting both strategic and financial objectives.
3. Recognize that the task of crafting a company strategy draws on the entrepreneur-
ial talents of managers at all organizational levels.
4. Understand why the strategic initiatives taken at various organizational levels must
be tightly coordinated to achieve companywide performance targets.
5. Become aware of what a company must do to achieve operating excellence and to
execute its strategy proficiently.
6. Understand why the strategic management process is ongoing, not an every-now-
and-then task.
7. Learn what leadership skills management must exhibit to drive strategy execution
forward.
8. Become aware of the role and responsibility of a company’s board of directors in
overseeing the strategic management process.

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If you don’t know where you are If you can articulate a vision that How can you lead if you don’t
going, any road will take you makes people passionate, there know where you are going?
there. are so many amazing things you —George Newman
can do. The Conference Board
—Cheshire Cat to Alice
Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland —Dr. Sophie Vandebroek
Xerox Corporation

C
rafting and executing strategy are the heart and strategic course, setting performance targets, and
soul of managing a business enterprise. But choosing a strategy capable of producing the desired
exactly what is involved in developing a strategy outcomes. We also explain why strategy making is
and executing it proficiently? What are the various a task for a company’s entire management team and
components of the strategy-making, strategy-executing discuss which kinds of strategic decisions tend to be
process? To what extent are company personnel— made at which levels of management. The chapter
aside from top executives—involved in the process? concludes with a look at the roles and responsibili-
In this chapter we present an overview of the mana- ties of a company’s board of directors in the strategy-
gerial ins and outs of crafting and executing company making, strategy-executing process and how good
strategies. We give special attention to manage- corporate governance protects shareholder interests
ment’s direction-setting responsibilities—charting a and promotes good management.

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24 Part 1 Concepts and Techniques for Crafting and Executing Strategy

WHAT DOES THE STRATEGY-MAKING, STRATEGY-

EXECUTING PROCESS ENTAIL?
The managerial process of crafting and executing a company’s strategy consists of five
interrelated and integrated phases:
1. Developing a strategic vision of where the company needs to head and what its
future product/customer/market/technology focus should be.
2. Setting objectives and using them as yardsticks for measuring the company’s per-
formance and progress.
3. Crafting a strategy to achieve the objectives and move the company along the
strategic course that management has charted.
4. Implementing and executing the chosen strategy efficiently and effectively.
5. Evaluating performance and initiating corrective adjustments in the company’s
long-term direction, objectives, strategy, or execution in light of actual experience,
changing conditions, new ideas, and new opportunities.
Figure 2.1 displays this five-phase process. Let’s examine each phase in enough detail to
set the stage for the forthcoming chapters and give you a bird’s-eye view of this book.

PHASE 1: DEVELOPING A STRATEGIC VISION

Very early in the strategy-making process, a company’s senior managers must wrestle
with the issue of what direction the company should take. Would a change in the com-
pany’s present product/market/customer/technology focus likely improve the company’s
market position and future prospects? Deciding to commit the company to follow one

Figure 2.1 The Strategy-Making, Strategy-Executing Process

Phase 1 Phase 2 Phase 3 Phase 4 Phase 5

Monitoring
Crafting a developments,
Developing strategy to Implementing evaluating
Setting
a strategic achieve the and executing performance,
objectives
vision objectives the strategy and making
and vision corrective
adjustments

Revise as needed in light of actual performance,

changing conditions, new opportunities, and new
ideas

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Chapter 2 Leading the Process of Crafting and Executing Strategy 25

Table 2.1 Factors to Consider in Deciding on a Company’s Future Direction

External Considerations Internal Considerations

• Is the outlook for the company promising if the company • What are our ambitions for the company—what
sticks with its present product/market/customer/ industry standing do we want the company to
technology focus and strategic direction? have?
• Are changes under way in the competitive landscape • Will our present business generate sufficient
acting to enhance or weaken the company’s prospects? growth and profitability to please shareholders?
• What, if any, new customer groups and/or geographic • What resource strengths does the company have
markets should the company get in position to serve? that will aid its ability to add new products/services
• Are there any emerging market opportunities the and/or get into new businesses?
company ought to pursue? • Is the company stretching its resources too
• Should we plan to abandon any of the markets, market thin by trying to compete in too many product
segments, or customer groups we are currently serving? categories or market arenas, some of which are
unprofitable?
• Is the company’s technological focus too broad or
too narrow?

direction versus another pushes managers to draw some carefully reasoned conclusions
about whether and how to modify the company’s product/market/customer/technology
focus and long-term direction. A number of factors need to be considered in deciding
where to head and why such a direction makes good business sense—see Table 2.1
Top management’s views and conclusions about the company’s direction
and future product/customer/market/technology focus constitute a strategic
CORE CONCEPT
vision for the company. A strategic vision delineates management’s aspira-
A strategic vision describes
tions for the business, providing a panoramic view of “where we are going.”
the route a company intends
A strategic vision thus points an organization in a particular direction, charts
to take in developing and
a strategic path, and molds organizational identity. A clearly articulated stra-
strengthening its business.
tegic vision communicates management’s aspirations to stakeholders and
It lays out the company’s stra-
helps steer the energies of company personnel in a common direction. For
tegic course in preparing for
instance, Henry Ford’s vision of a car in every garage had power because
the future.
it captured the imagination of others, aided internal efforts to mobilize the
Ford Motor Company’s resources, and served as a reference point for gaug-
ing the merits of the company’s strategic actions.
Well-conceived visions are distinctive and specific to a particular organization; they
avoid generic, feel-good statements like “We will become a global leader and the first
choice of customers in every market we choose to serve”—which could apply to any
of hundreds of organizations.1 And they are not the product of a committee charged
with coming up with an innocuous one-sentence vision that wins approval from various
stakeholders. Nicely worded vision statements with no specifics about the company’s
product/market/customer/technology focus fall well short of what it takes for a vision
to measure up. A strategic vision proclaiming management’s quest “to be the market
leader” or “to be the first choice of customers” or “to be the most innovative” or “to be
recognized as the best company in the industry” offer scant guidance about a company’s
direction and what changes and challenges lie on the road ahead.
For a strategic vision to function as a valuable managerial tool, it must (1) illumi-
nate the company’s directional path and (2) provide managers with a reference point
for making strategic decisions and preparing the company for the future. It must say
something definitive about the company’s future product/market/customer/technology
focus. A good vision always needs to be beyond a company’s immediate reach so as to
help unleash unified actions on the part of company personnel that move the company

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26 Part 1 Concepts and Techniques for Crafting and Executing Strategy

Table 2.2 Characteristics of an Effectively Worded Vision Statement

Graphic Paints a picture of the kind of company that management is trying to create and the
market position(s) the company is striving to stake out.
Directional Is forward-looking; describes the strategic course that management has charted and the
kinds of product/market/customer/technology changes that will help the company prepare
for the future.
Focused Is specific enough to provide managers with guidance in making decisions and allocating
resources.
Flexible Is not a once-and-for-all-time statement—the directional course that management has
charted may have to be adjusted as product/market/customer/technology circumstances
change.
Feasible Is within the realm of what the company can reasonably expect to achieve in due time.
Desirable Indicates why the direction makes good business sense and is in the long-term interests
of stakeholders (especially shareowners, employees, and customers).
Easy to communicate Is explainable in 5–10 minutes and, ideally, can be reduced to a simple, memorable
slogan (like Henry Ford’s famous vision of “a car in every garage”).

Source: Based partly on John P. Kotter, Leading Change (Boston: Harvard Business School Press, 1996), p. 72.

down the path of realizing the vision. Table 2.2 lists some characteristics of an effec-
tive vision statement.
A sampling of vision statements currently in use shows a range from strong/clear
to overly general/generic. A surprising number of the vision statements found on
company Web sites and in annual reports are vague about the company’s future prod-
uct/market/customer/technology focus. Some are nice-sounding but say little. Others
read like something written by a committee hoping to win the support of different
stakeholders. And some are so short on specifics as to apply to most any company
in any industry. Many read like a public relations statement—high-sounding words
that someone came up with because it is fashionable for companies to have an offi-
cial vision statement.2 Table 2.3 provides a list of the most common shortcomings in

Table 2.3 Common Shortcomings in Company Vision Statements

Vague or incomplete Short on specifics about where the company is headed or what the company is
doing to prepare for the future.
Not forward-looking Doesn’t indicate whether or how management intends to alter the company’s
current product/market/customer/technology focus.
Too broad So inclusive that the company could head in most any direction, pursue most any
opportunity, or enter most any business.
Bland or uninspiring Lacks the power to motivate company personnel or inspire shareholder confidence
about the company’s direction or future prospects
Not distinctive Provides no unique company identity; could apply to companies in any of several
industries (or at least several rivals operating in the same industry or market arena).
Too reliant on superlatives Doesn’t say anything specific about the company’s strategic course beyond the
pursuit of such lofty accolades as best, most successful, recognized leader, global
or worldwide leader, or first choice of customers.

Sources: Based on information in Hugh Davidson, The Committed Enterprise: How to Make Vision and Values Work (Oxford:
Butterworth-Heinemann, 2002), Chapter 2; and Michel Robert, Strategy Pure and Simple II: How Winning Companies Dominate Their
Competitors (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1998), Chapters 2, 3, and 6.

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Chapter 2 Leading the Process of Crafting and Executing Strategy 27

ILLUSTRATION CAPSULE 2.1

Examples of Strategic Visions—How Well Do They Measure Up?

Vision Statement Effective Elements Shortcomings

Red Hat
To extend our position as the most trusted Linux and • Directional • Bland or uninspiring
open source provider to the enterprise. We intend to • Focused
grow the market for Linux through a complete range • Feasible
of enterprise Red Hat Linux software, a powerful
Internet management platform, and associated • Desirable
support and services. • Easy to communicate

UBS
We are determined to be the best global financial • Focused • Not forward-looking
services company. We focus on wealth and asset • Feasible • Bland or uninspiring
management, and on investment banking and • Desirable
securities businesses. We continually earn recognition
and trust from clients, shareholders, and staff through
our ability to anticipate, learn and shape our future. We
share a common ambition to succeed by delivering
quality in what we do. Our purpose is to help our clients
make financial decisions with confidence. We use our
resources to develop effective solutions and services for
our clients. We foster a distinctive, meritocratic culture
of ambition, performance and learning as this attracts,
retains and develops the best talent for our company.
By growing both our client and our talent franchises, we
add sustainable value for our shareholders.
Caterpillar
Be the global leader in customer value. • Directional • Vague or incomplete
• Desirable • Could apply to many
• Easy to communicate companies in many industries
eBay
Provide a global trading platform where practically • Graphic • Too broad
anyone can trade practically anything. • Flexible
• Easy to communicate

Sources: Company documents and Web sites.

company vision statements. The one- or two-sentence vision statements most companies
make available to the public, of course, provide only a glimpse of what company exec-
utives are really thinking and the strategic course they have charted—company per-
sonnel nearly always have a much better understanding of the ins and outs of where
the company is headed and why than is revealed in the official vision statement. But
the real purpose of a vision statement is to serve as a management tool for giving the
organization a sense of direction. Like any tool, it can be used properly or improperly,
either clearly conveying a company’s strategic course or not.
Illustration Capsule 2.1 provides a critique of the strategic visions of several
prominent companies.

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28 Part 1 Concepts and Techniques for Crafting and Executing Strategy

How a Strategic Vision Differs from a Mission Statement

The defining characteristic of a well-conceived strategic vision is what it says about
the company’s future strategic course—“the direction we are headed and what our
future product-customer-market-technology focus will be.” While a company’s strate-
gic vision and its mission statement could be worded to cover much the same ground,
the truth is that the mission statements of most companies say much more about the
enterprise’s present business scope and purpose—“who we are, what we do, and
why we are here”—than they say about the strategic course that top management has
charted. Very few mission statements are forward-looking in content or emphasis.
The mission statements that one finds in company annual reports or
The distinction between a posted on company Web sites typically provide a brief overview of the com-
strategic vision and a mission pany’s present business purpose and reasons for existing, and sometimes
statement is fairly clear-cut: its geographic coverage or standing as a market leader. They may or may
A strategic vision portrays a not single out the company’s present products/services, the buyer needs
company’s future business it is seeking to satisfy, the customer groups it serves, or its technological
scope (“where we are going”), and business capabilities. But rarely do company mission statements say
whereas a company’s mission anything about where the company is headed, the anticipated changes in
typically describes its present its business, or the kind of company it is trying to become; hence they
business and purpose (“who lack the essential forward-looking quality of a strategic vision in specify-
we are, what we do, and why ing a company’s direction and future product-market-customer-technology
we are here”). focus. Consider, for example, the mission statement of Trader Joe’s, a spe-
cialty grocery chain:
The mission of Trader Joe’s is to give our customers the best food and beverage values that
they can find anywhere and to provide them with the information required for informed
buying decisions. We provide these with a dedication to the highest quality of customer
satisfaction delivered with a sense of warmth, friendliness, fun, individual pride, and com-
pany spirit.

Trader Joe’s mission statement does a good job of conveying “who we are, what
we do, and why we are here,” but it provides no sense of “where we are headed.”
The here-and-now theme that typifies so many company mission statements
means that there is value in distinguishing between the forward-looking concept of a
strategic vision and the company’s current mission. Thus, to mirror actual practice, we
will use the term mission statement to refer to an enterprise’s description of its present
business and why it exists. (Some companies use the term business purpose instead of
mission statement in characterizing their business activities; in practice, there seems
to be no meaningful difference between the terms—which one is used is a matter of
preference.)
Ideally, a company mission statement is sufficiently descriptive to identify the com-
pany’s products/services and specify the buyer needs it seeks to satisfy, the customer
groups or markets it is endeavoring to serve, and its approach to pleasing customers.
Not many company mission statements fully reveal all these facets of its business,
but most company mission statements do a decent job of indicating “who we are,
what we do, and why we are here.” A well-conceived mission statement should also
distinguish a company’s business makeup from that of other enterprises in language
specific enough to give the company its own identity. Occasionally, companies couch
their mission in terms of making a profit; this is misguided. Profit is more correctly an
objective and a result of what a company does. Moreover, earning a profit is the obvi-
ous intent of every commercial enterprise.

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Chapter 2 Leading the Process of Crafting and Executing Strategy 29

An example of a good mission statement with ample specifics about what the
organization does is that of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration
(OSHA): “to promote the safety and health of America’s workers by setting and
enforcing standards; providing training, outreach, and education; establishing part-
nerships; and encouraging continual process improvement in workplace safety and
health.” Google’s mission statement, while short, still captures the essence of the
company: “to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible
and useful.”

Linking the Vision/Mission with Company Values

CORE CONCEPT
Many companies have developed a statement of values to guide the com- A company’s values are the
pany’s pursuit of its vision/mission, strategy, and ways of operating. By beliefs, traits, and behavioral
values (or core values, as they are often called), we mean the beliefs, norms that company personnel
traits, and ways of doing things that management has determined should are expected to display in con-
guide the pursuit of its vision and strategy, the conduct of company’s ducting the company’s busi-
operations, and the behavior of company personnel. Values, good and bad, ness and pursuing its strategic
exist in every organization. They relate to such things as fair treatment, vision and strategy.
integrity, ethical behavior, innovation, teamwork, top-notch quality, supe-
rior customer service, social responsibility, and community citizenship.
Most companies have built their statements of values around four to eight traits that
company personnel are expected to display and that are supposed to be mirrored in
how the company conducts its business. At American Express, the core values are
customer commitment, quality, integrity, teamwork, and respect for people. Toyota
preaches respect for and development of its employees, teamwork, getting quality
right the first time, learning, continuous improvement, and embracing change in its
pursuit of low-cost, top-notch manufacturing excellence in motor vehicles.3 DuPont
stresses four values—safety, ethics, respect for people, and environmental steward-
ship; the first three have been in place since the company was founded 200 years
ago by E. I. du Pont. Pioneering, achieving, caring, and enduring are the core values
that guide decisions and actions at Abbott Laboratories, a pharmaceutical company
that appeared on Fortune’s “Most Admired Companies” list in 2008. Abbott chose
its four core values according to research suggesting these qualities were of utmost
importance to the company’s key stakeholders—patients, employees, and health care
professionals. The company conducted a series of values workshops in 2006 that
allowed more than 11,000 employees to identify regularly performed work behav-
iors that supported the company’s values. The company further solidified the val-
ues within the organization by asking that each business unit and employee develop
annual goals that embodied each of the four values.
The extent to which company values statements translate into actually living the
values varies widely. At companies such as Abbott, top executives believe in the impor-
tance of grounding company operations on sound values and ways of doing business.
In their view, holding company personnel accountable for displaying the stated values
is a way of infusing the company with the desired character, identity, and behavioral
norms—the values become the company’s genetic makeup, its DNA.
At the other extreme are companies with values that act as window dressing; the
values statement is merely a collection of nice words and phrases that have little dis-
cernible impact on either the behavior of company personnel or how the company
operates. Such companies have values statements because they are in vogue or because
they make the company look good. The now-defunct energy corporation Enron,

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30 Part 1 Concepts and Techniques for Crafting and Executing Strategy

for example, touted four corporate values—respect, integrity, communication, and

excellence—but some top officials engaged in dishonest and fraudulent maneuvers
that were concealed by “creative” accounting. The chasm between the company’s
stated values and the actions of its managers became evident during Enron’s dramatic
implosion and subsequent bankruptcy, along with criminal indictments, fines, or jail
terms for over a dozen Enron executives.
At companies where the stated values are real rather than cosmetic, managers
connect values to the pursuit of the strategic vision and mission in one of two ways.
In companies with long-standing values that are deeply entrenched in the corpo-
rate culture, senior managers are careful to craft a vision, mission, and strategy that
match established values; they also reiterate how the value-based behavioral norms
contribute to the company’s business success. In new companies or companies with
weak or incomplete sets of values, top management needs to consider what values,
behaviors, and business conduct should characterize the company and help drive the
vision and strategy forward. Values and behaviors that complement and support the
company’s vision are then drafted by these executives and circulated among managers
and employees for discussion and possible modification. A final values statement that
incorporates the desired behaviors and traits and that connects to the vision/mission is
then officially adopted. Some companies combine their vision and values into a single
statement or document, circulate it to all organization members, and in many instances
post the vision/mission and values statement on the company’s Web site. Illustration
Capsule 2.2 describes Yahoo’s values, and desired behaviors intended to aid it in its
mission of “connecting people to their passions, their communities, and the world’s
knowledge.”

Communicating the Strategic Vision

Effectively communicating the strategic vision down the line to lower-level managers
and employees is as important as the strategic soundness of the long-term direction
top management has chosen. Frontline employees can’t be expected to unite behind
managerial efforts to get the organization moving in the intended direction until they
understand why the strategic course that management has charted is reasonable and
beneficial.
Winning the support of organization members for the vision nearly
CORE CONCEPT always means putting “where we are going and why” in writing, distributing
An effectively communicated the statement organizationwide, and having executives personally explain
vision is a valuable manage- the vision and its rationale to as many people as feasible. Ideally, executives
ment tool for enlisting the com- should present their vision for the company in a manner that reaches out and
mitment of company personnel grabs people. An engaging and convincing strategic vision has enormous
to actions that get the com- motivational value—for the same reason that a stone mason is more inspired
pany moving in the intended by building a great cathedral for the ages than simply laying stones to create
direction. floors and walls. When managers articulate a vivid and compelling case for
where the company is headed, organization members begin to say, “This is
interesting and has a lot of merit. I want to be involved and do my part to
make it happen.” The more that a vision evokes positive support and excitement, the
greater its impact in terms of arousing a committed organizational effort and getting
company personnel to move in a common direction.4 Thus, executive ability to paint a
convincing and inspiring picture of a company journey and destination is an important
element of effective strategic leadership.

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Chapter 2 Leading the Process of Crafting and Executing Strategy 31

ILLUSTRATION CAPSULE 2.2

Yahoo’s Core Values

Our mission is to be the most essential global Internet TEAMWORK

service for consumers and businesses. How we pursue that We treat one another with respect and communicate
mission is influenced by a set of core values—the standards openly. We foster collaboration while maintaining individ-
that guide interactions with fellow Yahoos, the principles ual accountability. We encourage the best ideas to surface
that direct how we service our customers, the ideals that from anywhere within the organization. We appreciate the
drive what we do and how we do it. Many of our values value of multiple perspectives and diverse expertise.
were put into practice by two guys in a trailer some time
ago; others reflect ambitions as our company grows. All of
them are what we strive to achieve every day. COMMUNITY
We share an infectious sense of mission to make an impact
EXCELLENCE on society and empower consumers in ways never before
We are committed to winning with integrity. We know lead- possible. We are committed to serving both the Internet
ership is hard won and should never be taken for granted. community and our own communities.
We aspire to flawless execution and don’t take shortcuts on
quality. We seek the best talent and promote its develop-
ment. We are flexible and learn from our mistakes. FUN
We believe humor is essential to success. We applaud irrev-
INNOVATION erence and don’t take ourselves too seriously. We celebrate
We thrive on creativity and ingenuity. We seek the innova- achievement. We yodel.
tions and ideas that can change the world. We anticipate
market trends and move quickly to embrace them. We are
not afraid to take informed, responsible risk. WHAT YAHOO DOESN’T VALUE
At the end of its values statement, Yahoo makes a point
CUSTOMER FIXATION of singling out 54 things that it does not value, including
We respect our customers above all else and never for- bureaucracy, losing, “good enough,” arrogance, the status
get that they come to us by choice. We share a personal quo, following, formality, quick fixes, passing the buck,
responsibility to maintain our customers’ loyalty and trust. micromanaging, Monday-morning quarterbacks, 20/20
We listen and respond to our customers and seek to exceed hindsight, missing the boat, playing catch-up, punching the
their expectations. clock, and “shoulda coulda woulda.”

Source: www.yahoo.com (accessed March 24, 2008).

Expressing the Essence of the Vision in a Slogan The task of

effectively conveying the vision to company personnel is sometimes made Strategic visions become real
easier when management can capture the vision in a catchy, easily remem- only when the vision statement
bered slogan. A number of organizations have summed up their vision in a is imprinted in the minds of
brief phrase: organization members and then
translated into hard objectives
• FedEx: “Satifying worldwide demand for fast, time-definite, reliable
and strategies.
distribution.”
• Scotland Yard: “To make London the safest major city in the world.”
• The Home Depot: “Helping people improve the places where they live and
work.”
• Charles Schwab: “To provide customers with the most useful and ethical financial
services in the world.”

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32 Part 1 Concepts and Techniques for Crafting and Executing Strategy

Creating a short slogan to illuminate an organization’s direction and purpose helps

rally organization members to hurdle whatever obstacles lie in the company’s path and
to focus their attention on “where we are headed and why.”
When External Change Calls for a New Strategic Direction Sometimes
there’s an order-of-magnitude change in a company’s environment that dramatically
alters its prospects and mandates radical revision of its strategic course. Such changes
come about only rarely, but they do affect almost every industry. The technology com-
pany Intel has encountered two strategic inflection points during its history:
1. In the mid-1980s, when memory chips were Intel’s principal business, Japanese
manufacturers intent on dominating the memory chip business began setting their
prices 10 percent below the prices charged by Intel and other U.S. memory chip
manufacturers. Each time U.S. companies matched the Japanese price cuts, the
Japanese manufacturers responded with another 10 percent price cut. In 1985,
Gordon Moore, Intel’s chairman and cofounder, and Andrew Grove, Intel’s CEO,
jointly concluded that the best long-term solution was to abandon the memory
chip business even though it accounted for 70 percent of Intel’s revenue. A new
vision was developed that involved committing Intel’s full energies to becoming
the preeminent supplier of microprocessors to the personal computing industry.
Moore and Grove’s new vision and strategic course for Intel produced spectacu-
lar results. More than 80 percent of the world’s PCs have been made with Intel
microprocessors since 1996, and Intel has become the world’s most profitable
chip maker.
2. In 1998, when its chief managers recognized the growing importance of the Inter-
net, Intel refocused on becoming the preeminent building-block supplier to the
Internet economy and spurring efforts to make the Internet more useful. Intel’s
change in vision played a major role in getting more than 1 billion computers con-
nected to the Internet worldwide, installing millions of servers, and building an
Internet infrastructure that would support trillions of dollars of e-commerce and
serve as a worldwide communication medium.
As the Intel example forcefully demonstrates, when a company reaches a strategic
inflection point, management has some tough decisions to make about the company’s
course. Often it is a question of how to sustain company success, not just how to avoid
possible disaster. Responding quickly to unfolding changes in the marketplace lessens
a company’s chances of becoming trapped in a stagnant or declining business or letting
attractive new growth opportunities slip away.
Breaking Down Resistance to a New Strategic Vision It is particularly
important for executives to provide a compelling rationale for a bold new strategic
vision that takes a company in a dramatically different direction. Company personnel
are prone to resist change that requires new priorities and work practices when they
don’t understand or accept the need for such redirection. Hence, reiterating the impor-
tance of the new vision and addressing employees’ concerns about the new direction
head-on become part of the task in mobilizing support for the vision. A single instance
of stating the case for a new direction is not enough. Executives must repeat the rea-
sons for the new direction often and convincingly at company gatherings and in com-
pany publications. In addition, senior managers must reinforce their pronouncements
with updates about the company’s latest performance and how it confirms the validity
of the new vision. Unless and until the vision gains wide acceptance, it will have little
effect in moving the organization down the newly chosen path.

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Chapter 2 Leading the Process of Crafting and Executing Strategy 33

The Payoffs of a Clear Vision Statement In sum, a well-conceived, forcefully

communicated strategic vision pays off in several respects: (1) it crystallizes senior
executives’ own views about the firm’s long-term direction; (2) it reduces the risk of
rudderless decision making; (3) it is a tool for winning the support of organizational
members for internal changes that will help make the vision a reality; (4) it provides a
beacon for lower-level managers in forming departmental missions, setting departmental
objectives, and crafting functional and departmental strategies that are in sync with the
company’s overall strategy; and (5) it helps an organization prepare for the future. When
management is able to demonstrate significant progress in achieving these five benefits,
the first step in organizational direction setting has been successfully completed.

PHASE 2: SETTING OBJECTIVES

The managerial purpose of setting objectives is to convert the strategic vision
into specific performance targets—results and outcomes the company’s man- CORE CONCEPT
agement wants to achieve. Well-stated objectives are quantifiable, or measur- Objectives are an organiza-
able, and contain a deadline for achievement. As Bill Hewlett, cofounder of tion’s performance targets—
Hewlett-Packard, shrewdly observed, “You cannot manage what you cannot the results and outcomes
measure. . . . And what gets measured gets done.”5 Concrete, measurable objec- management wants to achieve.
tives are managerially valuable because they serve as yardsticks for tracking They function as yardsticks for
a company’s performance and progress. Indeed, the experiences of countless measuring how well the organi-
companies and managers teach that precisely spelling out how much of what zation is doing.
kind of performance by when acts as marching orders for the entire organiza-
tion and communicates to employees what level of performance is expected.6
Such an approach definitely beats setting vague targets like “increase sales” or “reduce
costs,” which specify neither how much nor when, or else exhorting company personnel
to “do the best they can” and then living with whatever results they deliver.

The Imperative of Setting Stretch Objectives

Ideally, managers ought to use the objective-setting exercise as a tool for
stretching an organization to perform at its full potential and deliver the best Setting stretch objectives is an
possible results. Challenging company personnel to exert their best efforts to effective tool for avoiding ho-
achieve “stretch” gains in performance pushes an enterprise to be more inven- hum results.
tive, to exhibit more urgency in improving both its financial performance and
its business position, and to be more intentional and focused in its actions.
Stretch objectives spur exceptional performance and help build a firewall against con-
tentment with modest gains in organizational performance. As Mitchell Leibovitz, for-
mer CEO of the auto parts and service retailer Pep Boys, once said, “If you want to have
ho-hum results, have ho-hum objectives.” There’s no better way to avoid ho-hum results
than by setting stretch objectives and using compensation incentives to motivate organi-
zation members to achieve the stretch performance targets.

What Kinds of Objectives to Set—The Need for

a Balanced Scorecard
Two very distinct types of performance yardsticks are required: those relating to finan-
cial performance and those relating to strategic performance—outcomes that indicate
a company is strengthening its marketing standing, competitive vitality, and future

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34 Part 1 Concepts and Techniques for Crafting and Executing Strategy

business prospects. Examples of commonly used financial objectives and strategic

objectives include the following:
Financial Objectives Strategic Objectives

• An x percent increase in annual • Winning an x percent market share

revenues • Achieving lower overall costs than
• Annual increases in after-tax profits rivals
of x percent • Overtaking key competitors on product
• Annual increases in earnings performance or quality or customer
per share of x percent service
• Annual dividend increases of x percent • Deriving x percent of revenues from
• Profit margins of x percent the sale of new products introduced
• An x percent return on capital employed within the past x years
(ROCE) or return on equity (ROE) • Achieving customer satisfaction rates
• Increased shareholder value—in the of x percent
form of an upward-trending stock prices • Consistently getting new or improved
and annual dividend increases products to market ahead of rivals
• Bond and credit ratings of x • Having stronger national or global sales
• Internal cash flows of x to fund new and distribution capabilities than rivals
capital investment

Achieving acceptable financial results is a must. Without adequate prof-

CORE CONCEPT itability and financial strength, a company impairs pursuit of its strategic
Financial objectives relate vision and puts its long-term health and ultimate survival in serious jeop-
to the financial performance ardy. Furthermore, subpar earnings and a weak balance sheet not only alarm
targets management has estab- shareholders and creditors but also put the jobs of senior executives at risk.
lished for the organization to Even so, good financial performance, by itself, is not enough. Of equal or
achieve. Strategic objec- greater importance is a company’s strategic performance—outcomes that
tives relate to target outcomes indicate whether the company’s market position and competitiveness are
that indicate a company is deteriorating, holding steady, or improving.
strengthening its market stand-
The Case for a Balanced Scorecard: Improved Strategic Perfor-
ing, competitive vitality, and
mance Fosters Better Financial Performance A company’s finan-
future business prospects.
cial performance measures are really lagging indicators that reflect the results
of past decisions and organizational activities.7 But a company’s past or cur-
rent financial performance is not a reliable indicator of its future prospects—poor finan-
cial performers often turn things around and do better, while good financial performers
can fall on hard times. The best and most reliable leading indicators of a company’s
future financial performance and business prospects are strategic outcomes that indi-
cate whether the company’s competitiveness and market position are stronger
or weaker. For instance, if a company has set aggressive strategic objectives
CORE CONCEPT and is achieving them—such that its competitive strength and market posi-
A company that pursues and tion are on the rise—then there’s reason to expect that its future financial
achieves strategic outcomes performance will be better than its current or past performance. If a company
that boost its competitiveness is losing ground to competitors and its market position is slipping—outcomes
and strength in the market- that reflect weak strategic performance (and, very likely, failure to set or
place is in much better position achieve strategic objectives)—then its ability to maintain its present profit-
to improve its future financial ability is highly suspect. Hence, whether a company’s managers set, pursue,
performance. and achieve stretch strategic objectives tend to be a reliable leading indicator
of whether its future financial performance will improve or stall.

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Chapter 2 Leading the Process of Crafting and Executing Strategy 35

ILLUSTRATION CAPSULE 2.3

Examples of Company Objectives

GENERAL MOTORS YUM! BRANDS (KFC, PIZZA HUT,

Reduce the percentage of automobiles using conventional TACO BELL)
internal combustion engines (ICE) through the develop- Open 100
KFC restaurants in Vietnam by 2010; expand
ment of hybrid ICEs, plug-in hybrid ICEs, range-extended Taco Bell restaurant concept to Dubai, India, Spain and
electric vehicles, and hydrogen fuel cell electric engines; Japan during 2008 and 2009; increase number of interna-
reduce automotive structural costs to benchmark lev- tional restaurant locations from 12,000 in 2007 to 15,000
els of 23 percent of revenue by 2012 from 34 percent in in 2012; increase operating profit from international oper-
2005; and reduce annual U.S. labor costs by an additional ations from $480 million in 2007 to $770 million in 2012;
$5 billion by 2011. expand Pizza Hut’s menu to include pasta and chicken
dishes; decrease the number of company owned restaurant
units in U.S. from 20% of units in 2007 to less than 10% of
THE HOME DEPOT units by 2010; and increase the number of Taco Bell units
Be the number one destination for professional contrac- in the U.S. by 2%–3% annually between 2008 and 2010.
tors, whose business accounted for roughly 30 percent
of 2006 sales; improve in-stock positions so customers AVON
can find and buy exactly what they need; deliver dif- Increase our beauty sales and market share; strengthen our
ferentiated customer service and the know-how that our brand image; enhance the representative experience; realize
customers have come to expect from The Home Depot; annualized cost savings of $430 million through improve-
repurchase $22.5 billion of outstanding shares during ments in marketing processes, sales model and organiza-
2008; and open 55 new store locations with 5 store relo- tional activities; and achieve annualized cost savings of
cations in 2008. $200 million through a strategic sourcing initiative.

Sources: Information posted on company Web sites (accessed March 27, 2008).

Consequently, a balanced scorecard for measuring company performance—one

that tracks the achievement of both financial objectives and strategic objectives—
is optimal.8 Just tracking a company’s financial performance overlooks the fact
that what ultimately enables a company to deliver better financial results from its
operations is the achievement of strategic objectives that improve its competitive-
ness and market strength. The surest path to boosting company profitability quarter
after quarter and year after year is to relentlessly pursue strategic outcomes that
strengthen the company’s market position and produce a growing competitive advan-
tage over rivals.
In 2006, approximately 70 percent of global companies used a balanced score-
card approach to measuring strategic and financial performance.9 Organizations that
have adopted a balanced scorecard approach to setting objectives and measuring per-
formance include United Parcel Service (UPS), Ann Taylor Stores, the UK Ministry
of Defense, Caterpillar, Daimler, Hilton Hotels, Duke University Hospital, and Sie-
mens.10 Illustration Capsule 2.3 provides selected strategic and financial objectives of
four prominent companies.
Why Both Short-Term and Long-Term Objectives Are Needed As a
rule, a company’s set of financial and strategic objectives ought to include both near-
term and longer-term performance targets. Having quarterly and annual objectives
focuses attention on delivering immediate performance improvements. Targets to be
achieved within three to five years prompt considerations of what to do now to put the

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36 Part 1 Concepts and Techniques for Crafting and Executing Strategy

company in position to perform better later. Long-term objectives take on particular

importance because it is generally in the best interest of shareholders for companies
to be managed for optimal long-term performance. When trade-offs have to be made
between achieving long-run objectives and achieving short-run objectives, long-run
objectives should take precedence (unless achieving one or more short-run perfor-
mance targets has overriding importance). Shareholders are seldom well-served by
repeated management actions that sacrifice better long-term performance in order to
make quarterly or annual targets.
Strategic Intent: Relentless Pursuit of an Ambitious Long-Term
CORE CONCEPT Strategic Objective Very ambitious companies often establish a long-
A company exhibits strategic term strategic objective that clearly signals strategic intent to be a winner in
intent when it relentlessly the marketplace, often against long odds.11 A company’s strategic intent can
pursues an ambitious strategic entail unseating the existing industry leader, becoming the dominant market
objective, concentrating the share leader, delivering the best customer service of any company in the
full force of its resources and industry (or the world), or turning a new technology into products capable
competitive actions on achiev- of changing the way people work and live. For some years, Toyota has been
ing that objective. charging to overtake General Motors as the world’s largest motor vehicle
producer—a goal it achieved in 2007 when its global sales totaled 9.37 mil-
lion cars and trucks compared to General Motors’ 2007 sales of 8.8 million
cars and trucks.12 During the mid-1970s, United Parcel Service (UPS) management,
recognizing that the world was becoming more interconnected, developed the strategic
intent of becoming a leading shipper of small packages in international markets. The
company made multiple mistakes as it expanded into foreign locations and failed to
realize consistent returns on its heavy investments outside the United States for more
than 20 years, but did not abandon its long-term strategic goal. By 2007, however,
shipments of small packages had become the company’s fastest growing and most
profitable business. Honda, too, has engaged in strategic intent with the development
of its very light jet. The company’s 20-plus-year dream of producing a “Honda Civic
of the sky” began in the mid-1980s. The HondaJet was expected to obtain FAA certifi-
cation in 2009, with production beginning in 2010.13
In many cases, ambitious companies that establish exceptionally bold strategic
objectives and have an unshakable commitment to achieving them lack the immedi-
ate capabilities and market grasp to achieve such lofty targets. But they pursue their
strategic objective relentlessly, sometimes even obsessively. They rally the organiza-
tion around efforts to make the strategic intent a reality. They go all out to marshal the
resources and capabilities to close in on their strategic target (which is often global
market leadership) as rapidly as they can. They craft potent offensive strategies cal-
culated to throw rivals off balance, put them on the defensive, and force them into an
ongoing game of catch-up. As a consequence, capably managed up-and-coming enter-
prises with strategic intents exceeding their present reach and resources are a force
to be reckoned with, often proving to be more formidable competitors over time than
larger, cash-rich rivals that have modest strategic objectives and market ambitions.
The Need for Objectives at All Organizational Levels Objective setting
should not stop with top management’s establishing of companywide performance tar-
gets. Company objectives need to be broken down into performance targets for each
of the organization’s separate businesses, product lines, functional departments, and
individual work units. Company performance can’t reach full potential unless each
organizational unit sets and pursues performance targets that contribute directly to
the desired companywide outcomes and results. Objective setting is thus a top-down

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Chapter 2 Leading the Process of Crafting and Executing Strategy 37

process that must extend to the lowest organizational levels. And it means that each
organizational unit must set performance targets that support—rather than conflict
with or negate—the achievement of companywide strategic and financial objectives.

PHASE 3: CRAFTING A STRATEGY

The task of crafting a strategy entails addressing a series of hows: how to grow the
business, how to please customers, how to outcompete rivals, how to respond to chang-
ing market conditions, how to manage each functional piece of the business, how to
develop needed competencies and capabilities, and how to achieve strategic and finan-
cial objectives. It also means exercising astute entrepreneurship in choosing among
the various strategic alternatives—proactively searching for opportunities to do new
things or to do existing things in new or better ways.14
The faster a company’s business environment is changing, the more critical the
need for its managers to be good entrepreneurs in diagnosing the direction and force
of the changes under way and in responding with timely adjustments in strategy. Strat-
egy makers have to pay attention to early warnings of future change and be willing to
experiment with different ways to establish a market position. When obstacles unex-
pectedly appear in a company’s path, it is up to management to adapt rapidly and inno-
vatively. Masterful strategies come partly (maybe mostly) by doing things differently
from competitors where it counts—innovating more creatively, being more efficient,
being more imaginative, adapting faster—rather than running with the herd. Good
strategy making is therefore inseparable from good business entrepreneurship. One
cannot exist without the other.

Strategy Making Involves Managers at All

Organizational Levels
A company’s senior executives obviously have important strategy-making roles. The
chief executive officer (CEO), as captain of the ship, carries the mantles of chief direc-
tion setter, chief objective setter, chief strategy maker, and chief strategy implementer
for the total enterprise. Ultimate responsibility for leading the strategy-making, strat-
egy-executing process rests with the CEO. In some enterprises the CEO or owner
functions as strategic visionary and chief architect of strategy, personally deciding
what the key elements of the company’s strategy will be, although others may well
assist with data gathering and analysis. Also, the CEO may seek the advice of other
senior managers and key employees in fashioning an overall strategy and deciding
on important strategic moves. A CEO-centered approach to strategy development is
characteristic of small owner-managed companies and sometimes large corporations
that have been founded by the present CEO or that have CEOs with strong strategic
leadership skills. Larry Ellison at Oracle, Andrea Jung at Avon, Steve Jobs at Apple,
and Howard Schultz at Starbucks are prominent examples of corporate CEOs who
have wielded a heavy hand in shaping their company’s strategy.
In most companies, however, strategy is the product of more than just the CEO’s
handiwork. Typically, other senior executives—business unit heads; the chief finan-
cial officer (CFO); and vice presidents for production, marketing, human resources,
and other functional departments have influential strategy-making roles. Normally, a
company’s CFO is in charge of devising and implementing an appropriate financial

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38 Part 1 Concepts and Techniques for Crafting and Executing Strategy

strategy; the production vice president takes the lead in developing the company’s
production strategy; the marketing vice president orchestrates sales and marketing
strategy; a brand manager is in charge of the strategy for a particular brand in the
company’s product lineup, and so on.
But even here it is a mistake to view strategy making as a top management func-
tion, the exclusive province of owner-entrepreneurs, CEOs, and other senior execu-
tives. The more that a company’s operations cut across different products, industries,
and geographical areas, the more that headquarters executives have little option but to
delegate considerable strategy-making authority down the line to managers in charge
of particular subsidiaries, geographic sales offices, distribution centers, and plants.
On-the-scene managers are in the best position to evaluate the local situation and can
be expected to have detailed familiarity with local customer requirements and expecta-
tions as well as with other aspects surrounding the strategic issues and choices in their
arena of authority. This gives them an edge over headquarters executives in keeping
the company’s strategy responsive to local market and competitive conditions.
Take, for example, a company like General Electric (GE), a $173 billion corporation
with operating segments ranging from financial services to aircraft engine manufactur-
ing to television broadcasting. While top-level GE executives may well be personally
involved in shaping GE’s overall strategy and fashioning important strategic moves,
it doesn’t follow that a few senior executives at GE headquarters have either enough
expertise or detailed understanding of all the relevant factors to wisely craft all the stra-
tegic initiatives for its diverse business lineup and thousands of products. They simply
cannot know enough about the situation in every General Electric organizational unit to
decide upon every strategy detail and direct every strategic move made in GE’s world-
wide organization. Rather, it takes involvement on the part of GE’s whole management
team—top executives; subsidiary heads; division heads; and key managers in such geo-
graphic units as sales offices, distribution centers, and plants—to craft the thousands of
strategic initiatives that end up comprising the whole of GE’s strategy.
While managers farther down in the managerial hierarchy obviously
CORE CONCEPT have a narrower, more specific strategy-making role than managers closer
In most companies, crafting to the top, the important understanding here is that in most of today’s com-
and executing strategy is a panies every manager typically has a strategy-making role—ranging from
collaborative effort in which minor to major—for the area he or she heads. Hence, any notion that an
every manager has a role for organization’s strategists are at the top of the management hierarchy and that
the area he or she heads. It is midlevel and frontline personnel merely carry out their strategic directives
flawed thinking to view craft- needs to be cast aside. In companies with wide-ranging operations, it is far
ing and executing strategy as more accurate to view strategy making as a collaborative effort involving
something only high-level man- managers (and sometimes key employees) down through the whole organi-
agers do. zational hierarchy. A valuable strength of collaborative strategy making is
that the team of people charged with crafting the strategy often include the
very people who will also be charged with executing it. Giving people an
influential stake in crafting the strategy they must later help execute not only builds
commitment to new strategies but also enhances accountability at multiple levels of
management—the excuse “It wasn’t my idea to do this” won’t fly.

A Company’s Strategy-Making Hierarchy

It thus follows that a company’s overall strategy is a collection of strategic initiatives
and actions devised by managers and key employees up and down the whole organiza-
tional hierarchy. As an enterprise’s operations become larger, more diverse, and more

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Chapter 2 Leading the Process of Crafting and Executing Strategy 39

geographically scattered, progressively more managers and key employees at more

levels in the organizational hierarchy tend to become personally engaged in crafting
strategic initiatives and exercise a relevant strategy-making role. Figure 2.2 shows who
is generally responsible for devising what pieces of a company’s overall strategy.
In diversified, multibusiness companies where the strategies of several different
businesses have to be managed, the strategy-making task involves four distinct types
or levels of strategy, each of which involves different facets of the company’s overall
strategy:
1. Corporate strategy consists of initiatives to diversify into different industries, boost
the combined performance of the set of businesses the company has diversified into,
and figure out how to capture cross-business synergies and turn them into com-
petitive advantage. Senior corporate executives normally have lead responsibility
for devising corporate strategy and for choosing among whatever recommended
actions bubble up from the organization below. Major strategic decisions are usually
reviewed and approved by the company’s board of directors. We will look deeper into
the strategy-making process at diversified companies when we get to Chapter 8.
2. Business strategy concerns the actions and approaches crafted to produce success-
ful performance in one specific line of business. Orchestrating the development
of business-level strategy is the responsibility of the manager in charge of the
business. The business head has at least two other strategy-related roles: (a) seeing
that lower-level strategies are well conceived and well matched to the overall busi-
ness strategy, and (b) getting major business-level strategic moves approved by
corporate-level officers (and sometimes the board of directors) and keeping them
informed of emerging strategic issues. In diversified companies, business-unit
heads may have the additional obligation of making sure business-level objectives
and strategy conform to corporate-level objectives and strategy themes.
3. Functional-area strategies concern the actions and practices employed in manag-
ing particular functions or business processes or activities within a business. A
company’s marketing strategy, for example, represents the managerial game plan
for running the sales and marketing part of the business. A company’s product
development strategy represents the managerial game plan for keeping the compa-
ny’s product lineup in tune with what buyers are looking for. The primary role of a
functional strategy is to add specifics to a company’s business-level strategy. Lead
responsibility for functional strategies within a business is normally delegated to
the heads of the respective functions, with the general manager of the business
having final approval and perhaps even exerting a strong influence over the par-
ticular pieces of the strategies.
4. Operating strategies concern the relatively narrow strategic initiatives and
approaches for managing key operating units (plants, distribution centers, geo-
graphic units) and specific operating activities with strategic significance (adver-
tising campaigns, supply chain activities, and Internet sales operations). Operating
strategies, while of limited scope, add further detail and completeness to func-
tional strategies and to the overall business strategy. Lead responsibility for oper-
ating strategies is usually delegated to frontline managers, subject to review and
approval by higher-ranking managers.
Even though operating strategy is at the bottom of the strategy-making hierarchy,
its importance should not be downplayed. A major plant that fails in its strategy to
achieve production volume, unit cost, and quality targets can damage the company’s

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40 Part 1 Concepts and Techniques for Crafting and Executing Strategy

Figure 2.2 A Company’s Strategy-Making Hierarchy

Corporate
Orchestrated by the Strategy
In the case of a
CEO and other The overall companywide
single-business
senior executives. game plan for a managing a
company, these
set of businesses
two levels of the
strategy-making
hierarchy merge
Two-Way Influence into one level—
business
Orchestrated by the strategy—that is
general managers of Business Strategy orchestrated by
each of the company‘s (one for each business the the company's
different lines of company has diversified into) CEO and other
business, often with • How to strengthen market position top executives.
advice and input from and gain competitive advantage
the heads of functional • Actions to build competitive
area activities within capabilities
each business and
other key people.

Two-Way Influence

Functional area
Orchestrated by the
strategies within
heads of major
each business
functional activities • Add relevant detail to the hows of
within overall business strategy
a particular business, • Provide a game plan for managing
often in collaboration a particular activity in ways that
with other key support the overall business
people. strategy

Two-Way Influence
Orchestrated by brand
managers; the
operating managers of Operating
plants, distribution strategies within
centers, and each business
geographic units; and
• Add detail and completeness to business
the managers of
and functional strategy
strategically important
• Provide a game plan for managing specific
activities like
lower-echelon activities with strategic
advertising
significance
and Web site
operations, often
in collaboration with
other key people

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Chapter 2 Leading the Process of Crafting and Executing Strategy 41

reputation for quality products and undercut the achievement of company sales and
profit objectives. Frontline managers are thus an important part of an organization’s
strategy-making team. One cannot reliably judge the strategic importance of a given
action simply by the strategy level or location within the managerial hierarchy where
it is initiated.
In single-business enterprises, the corporate and business levels of strategy-
making merge into one level—business strategy—because the strategy for the whole
company involves only one distinct line of business. Thus, a single-business enterprise
has three levels of strategy: business strategy for the company as a whole, functional-
area strategies for each main area within the business, and operating strategies under-
taken by lower-echelon managers. Proprietorships, partnerships, and owner-managed
enterprises may have only one or two strategy-making levels since their strategy-
making, strategy-executing process can be handled by just a few key people.

A Strategic Vision
Objectives
Strategy 

A Strategic Plan
Developing a strategic vision and mission, setting objectives, and craft-
ing a strategy are basic direction-setting tasks. They map out where a CORE CONCEPT
company is headed, the targeted strategic and financial outcomes, and A company’s strategic plan
the competitive moves and internal actions to be used in achieving the lays out its future direction,
desired business results. Together, they constitute a strategic plan for performance targets, and
coping with industry and competitive conditions, combating the expected strategy.
actions of the industry’s key players, and confronting the challenges and
issues that stand as obstacles to the company’s success.15
In companies that do regular strategy reviews and develop explicit strategic
plans, the strategic plan usually ends up as a written document that is circulated to
most managers and perhaps selected employees. Near-term performance targets are
the part of the strategic plan most often spelled out explicitly and communicated to
managers and employees. A number of companies summarize key elements of their
strategic plans in the company’s annual report to shareholders, in postings on their
Web site, or in statements provided to the business media, whereas others, perhaps for
reasons of competitive sensitivity, make only vague, general statements about their
strategic plans. In small, privately owned companies, it is rare for strategic plans to
exist in written form. Small companies’ strategic plans tend to reside in the thinking
and directives of owners/executives, with aspects of the plan being revealed in meet-
ings and conversations with company personnel, and the understandings and commit-
ments among managers and key employees about where to head, what to accomplish,
and how to proceed.

PHASE 4: IMPLEMENTING AND EXECUTING

THE STRATEGY
Managing the implementation and execution of strategy is an operations-oriented,
make-things-happen activity aimed at performing core business activities in a strat-
egy-supportive manner. It is easily the most demanding and time-consuming part of
the strategy management process. Converting strategic plans into actions and results
tests a manager’s ability to direct organizational change, motivate people, build and

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42 Part 1 Concepts and Techniques for Crafting and Executing Strategy

strengthen company competencies and competitive capabilities, create and nurture a

strategy-supportive work climate, and meet or beat performance targets. Initiatives to
put the strategy in place and execute it proficiently have to be launched and managed
on many organizational fronts.
Management’s action agenda for implementing and executing the chosen strat-
egy emerges from assessing what the company will have to do differently or better
to achieve the targeted financial and strategic performance. Each company manager
has to think through the answer to the following questions: “What has to be done
in my area to execute my piece of the strategic plan?” and “What actions should I
take to get the process under way?” How much internal change is needed depends on
how much of the strategy is new, how far internal practices and competencies deviate
from what the strategy requires, and how well the present work climate/culture sup-
ports good strategy execution. Depending on the amount of internal change involved,
full implementation and proficient execution of company strategy (or important new
pieces thereof) can take several months to several years.
In most situations, managing the strategy execution process includes the following
principal aspects:
• Staffing the organization with the needed skills and expertise, consciously build-
ing and strengthening strategy-supportive competencies and competitive capabili-
ties, and organizing the work effort.
• Allocating ample resources to activities critical to strategic success.
• Ensuring that policies and procedures facilitate rather than impede effective
execution.
• Using the best-known practices to perform core business activities and pushing for
continuous improvement. Organizational units have to periodically reassess how
things are being done and diligently pursue useful changes and improvements.
• Installing information and operating systems that enable company personnel to do
their jobs better and quicker.
• Motivating people to pursue the target objectives energetically and, if need be,
modifying their duties and job behavior to better fit the requirements of successful
strategy execution.
• Tying rewards and incentives directly to the achievement of performance objec-
tives and good strategy execution.
• Creating a company culture and work climate conducive to successful strategy
execution.
• Exerting the internal leadership needed to drive implementation forward and keep
improving the strategy execution process. When stumbling blocks or weaknesses
are encountered, management has to see that they are addressed and rectified in
timely and effective fashion.
Good strategy execution requires diligent pursuit of operating excellence. It is
a job for a company’s whole management team. And success hinges on the skills
and cooperation of operating managers who can push needed changes in their orga-
nizational units and consistently deliver good results. Implementation of the chosen
strategy can be considered successful if the company meets or beats its strategic and
financial performance targets and shows good progress in achieving management’s
strategic vision.

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Chapter 2 Leading the Process of Crafting and Executing Strategy 43

PHASE 5: EVALUATING PERFORMANCE AND INITIATING

CORRECTIVE ADJUSTMENTS
The fifth phase of the strategy management process—monitoring external develop-
ments, evaluating the company’s progress, and making corrective adjustments—is the
trigger point for deciding whether to continue or change the company’s vision, objec-
tives, strategy, and/or strategy execution methods. So long as the company’s direction
and strategy seem well matched to industry and competitive conditions and perfor-
mance targets are being met, company executives may well decide to stay the course.
Simply fine-tuning the strategic plan and continuing with efforts to improve strategy
execution are sufficient.
But whenever a company encounters disruptive changes in its environment, ques-
tions need to be raised about the appropriateness of its direction and strategy. If a
company experiences a downturn in its market position or persistent shortfalls in per-
formance, then company managers are obligated to ferret out the causes—do they
relate to poor strategy, poor strategy execution, or both?—and take timely corrective
action. A company’s direction, objectives, and strategy have to be revisited anytime
external or internal conditions warrant. It is to be expected that a company will modify
its strategic vision, direction, objectives, and strategy over time.
Likewise, it is not unusual for a company to find that one or more
aspects of its strategy implementation and execution are not going as well CORE CONCEPT
as intended. Proficient strategy execution is always the product of much A company’s vision, objectives,
organizational learning. It is achieved unevenly—coming quickly in some strategy, and approach to strat-
areas and proving nettlesome in others. It is both normal and desirable to egy execution are never final;
periodically assess strategy execution to determine which aspects are work- managing strategy is an ongo-
ing well and which need improving. Successful strategy execution entails ing process, not an every-now-
vigilantly searching for ways to improve and then making corrective adjust- and-then task.
ments whenever and wherever it is useful to do so.

LEADING THE STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT PROCESS

The litany for leading the process of making and executing strategy is simple enough:
Craft a sound strategic plan, implement it, execute it to the fullest, adjust it as needed,
and win! But the leadership challenges are significant and diverse. Exerting take-charge
leadership, being a spark plug for change and action, ramrodding things through, and
achieving results thrusts top executives and senior mangers in charge of business units,
product categories, geographic regions, and major production and distribution facili-
ties into a variety of leadership roles: visionary, strategist, resource acquirer, capa-
bilities builder, motivator, and crisis solver, to mention a few. There are times when
leading the strategic management process entails being a hard-nosed authoritarian,
and times when it is best to be a perceptive listener and a compromising decision
maker; there are times when matters are best delegated to people closest to the scene
of the action, and times when being a coach is the proper role. Many occasions call
for company leaders to assume a highly visible role and put in long hours guiding the
process, while others entail only a brief ceremonial performance with the details del-
egated to subordinates.

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44 Part 1 Concepts and Techniques for Crafting and Executing Strategy

In general, leading the strategic management process calls for the following six
actions on the part of senior executives:
1. Staying on top of how well things are going.
2. Making sure the company has a good strategic plan.
3. Putting constructive pressure on organizational units to achieve good results and
operating excellence.
4. Pushing corrective actions to improve both the company’s strategy and how well it
is being executed.
5. Leading the development of stronger core competencies and competitive
capabilities.
6. Displaying ethical integrity and leading social responsibility initiatives.

Staying on Top of How Well Things Are Going

To stay on top of whether the company’s direction and strategy are on track and how
well the strategy execution process is going, a manager needs to develop a broad net-
work of contacts and sources of information, both formal and informal. The regular
channels include talking with key subordinates, attending presentations and meetings,
talking to customers, watching the competitive reactions of rival firms, exchanging
e-mail and holding telephone conversations with people in outlying locations, mak-
ing onsite visits, and listening to rank-and-file employees. However, some sources of
information are more trustworthy than the rest, and the views and perspectives offered
by different people can vary widely. Presentations and briefings by subordinates may
not represent the whole truth. Bad news or problems may be minimized or in some
cases not reported at all by subordinates in hopes that they can turn things around
before the shortcomings are noticed. Hence, senior managers have to make sure that
they have accurate information and a feel for the existing situation. They have to con-
firm whether things are on track, learn what obstacles lie in the path of good financial
and strategic performance, and develop a basis for determining what, if anything, they
can personally do to improve the strategy management process.
One of the best ways for executives to stay on top of things is by mak-
CORE CONCEPT ing regular visits to the field and talking with many different people at many
Management by walking different levels—a technique often labeled managing by walking around
around (MBWA) is one of (MBWA). Wal-Mart executives have had a long-standing practice of spend-
the techniques that effective ing two to three days every week visiting Wal-Mart’s stores and talking with
leaders use to stay on top of store managers and employees. Sam Walton, Wal-Mart’s founder, insisted,
how well things are going and “The key is to get out into the store and listen to what the associates have to
to learn what issues they need say.” Jack Welch, the highly effective CEO of General Electric (GE) from
to address. 1980 to 2001, not only spent several days each month personally visiting GE
operations and talking with major customers but also arranged his sched-
ule so that he could spend time exchanging information and ideas with GE
managers from all over the world who were attending classes at the company’s leader-
ship development center near GE’s headquarters. Some companies have weekly get-
togethers in each division (often on Friday afternoons), attended by both executives
and employees, to create a regular opportunity for tidbits of information to flow freely
between down-the-line employees and executives. Many manufacturing executives
make a point of strolling the factory floor to talk with workers and meeting regu-
larly with union officials. Some managers operate out of open cubicles in big spaces
populated with other personnel in open cubicles so that they can interact easily and
frequently with coworkers. Jeff Bezos, Amazon.com’s CEO, is noted for his practice

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Chapter 2 Leading the Process of Crafting and Executing Strategy 45

of MBWA, firing off a battery of questions when he tours facilities and insisting that
Amazon managers spend time in the trenches to prevent overly abstract thinking and
disconnections from the reality of what’s happening.16
Most managers rightly attach great importance to gathering information and opin-
ions firsthand from people at different organizational levels about how well various
aspects of the strategy-execution process are going. Such contacts give managers a feel
for what progress is being made, what problems are being encountered, and whether
additional resources or different approaches may be needed. Just as important, MBWA
provides opportunities for managers to give encouragement, lift spirits, shift attention
from the old to the new priorities, and create some excitement—all of which generate
positive energy and help mobilize organizational efforts behind strategy execution.

Making Sure a Company Has a Good Strategic Plan

It is the responsibility of top executives—most especially the CEO—to ensure that a
company has a sound and cohesive strategic plan. There are two things that the CEO
and other top-level executives should do in leading the development of a good stra-
tegic plan. One is to effectively communicate the company’s vision, objectives, and
major strategy components to down-the-line managers and key personnel. The com-
pany’s vision, mission, objectives, and overall strategy paint the white lines for strat-
egy makers throughout the organization. Midlevel and frontline managers cannot craft
unified strategic moves without first understanding the company’s long-term direc-
tion and knowing the major components of the company’s strategy that their strategy-
making efforts are supposed to support and enhance. Thus, leading the development
of a strategic plan is very much a top management responsibility, even though the
tasks of setting objectives and formulating the details of strategy are most definitely a
team effort, involving company personnel at the corporate and business levels on down
to the associated functional and operating levels—as displayed in Figure 2.2.
When the strategizing process is effectively led by the CEO and other top executives,
with lower-level strategy-making efforts taking their cues from the higher-level strategy
elements they are supposed to complement and support, there’s less potential for conflict
between different levels in the strategy hierarchy. An absence of strong strategic leader-
ship from the top sets the stage for some degree of strategic confusion and disunity.
A second responsibility of senior managers is leading the development of a good
strategic plan. There are two things that the CEO and other top-level executives should
do in leading the development of a good strategic plan. The first is to effectively com-
municate the company’s vision, objectives, and major strategy components to down-the-
line managers and key personnel. The greater the numbers of company personnel who
know, understand, and buy into the company’s long-term direction and overall strategy,
the smaller the risk that organization units will go off in conflicting strategic directions.
The second is to exercise due diligence in reviewing lower-level strategies for consis-
tency and support of higher-level strategies. Any strategy conflicts must be addressed
and resolved, either by modifying the lower-level strategies with conflicting elements or
by adapting the higher-level strategy to accommodate more appealing strategy ideas and
initiatives bubbling up from below. Anything less than a unified collection of strategies
weakens the overall strategy and is likely to impair company performance.
The Importance of Corporate Intrapreneurship in the Strategy-Making
Process Keeping the organization bubbling with fresh supplies of ideas and sugges-
tions for improvement is another key demand of strategic leadership. Managers cannot
mandate innovative suggestions by simply exhorting people to “be creative.” Rather,

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46 Part 1 Concepts and Techniques for Crafting and Executing Strategy

they have to foster a culture where innovative ideas and experimentation with new ways
of doing things can blossom and thrive. In some companies, top management makes
a regular practice of encouraging individuals and teams to develop and champion pro-
posals for new product lines and new business ventures. The idea is to unleash the tal-
ents and energies of promising “corporate intrapreneurs,” letting them try out untested
business ideas and giving them the room to pursue new strategic initiatives. Executives
judge which proposals merit support, give the chosen intrapreneurs the organizational
and budgetary support they need, and let them run with the ball. Thus, important pieces
of company strategy can originate with those intrapreneurial individuals and teams who
succeed in championing a proposal through the approval stage and then end up being
charged with the lead role in launching new products, overseeing the company’s entry
into new geographic markets, or heading up new business ventures.
At IBM, the company’s chief managers found that its reward system—which
focused on short-term results, fostered a managerial preoccupation with current mar-
kets, and bred an analysis-driven culture—discouraged new business development and
slowed the strategy-making process to 12–18 months. To encourage corporate intra-
preneurship, IBM developed a new set of policies to foster growth through emerg-
ing business opportunities. The new approach encouraged senior managers to push
promising entrepreneurial business ventures proposed by subordinates into the market
through experiments with existing customers. Those ideas that customers valued and
that were deemed capable of generating acceptable revenues and profits went on to
be marketed to new customers. Within five years, IBM’s corporate intrapreneurship
efforts had developed 25 new businesses; 3 of those failed, but the remaining 22 gener-
ated more than $15 billion in revenues in 2004.17
Organizational leaders can promote innovation and keep the strategy fresh in any
of the following ways:
• Encouraging individuals and groups to brainstorm proposals for new business
ventures or improving existing products—The leadership trick in promoting cor-
porate intrapreneurship is to keep a sense of urgency alive in the business so that
people see change and innovation as necessities.
• Taking special pains to foster, nourish, and support people who are eager to test
new business ventures and explore adding new or improved products—People
with maverick ideas or out-of-the-ordinary proposals have to be given room
to operate. Above all, would-be champions who advocate radical or different
ideas must not be looked on as disruptive or troublesome. The best champions
and change agents are persistent, tenacious, and committed to seeing their idea
through to success.
• Ensuring that the rewards for successful champions are large and visible and
that people who champion ideas for new products or business ventures that
end up being discarded are not punished but rather encouraged to try again—
Encouraging lots of tries is important, since many ideas for new products and
business ventures won’t pan out.
• Using all kinds of ad hoc organizational forms to support ideas and
experimentation — Forming venture teams and new business task forces to explore
promising ideas, along with top management willingness to give entrepreneurial
employees the latitude to work on a promising project without official authoriza-
tion, are just a few of the possible organizational means a company can use to fos-
ter innovation. (Skunkworks is a term for a group of people who work on a project
outside the usual norms or rules in an organization.)

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Chapter 2 Leading the Process of Crafting and Executing Strategy 47

Putting Constructive Pressure on Organizational Units

to Achieve Good Results and Operating Excellence
Managers have to be out front in mobilizing organizational energy behind the drive for
good financial and strategic performance and operating excellence. Part of the leader-
ship requirement here entails nurturing a results-oriented work climate, where per-
formance standards are high and a spirit of achievement is pervasive. If management
wants to drive the strategic management process by instilling a results-oriented work
climate, then senior executives have to take the lead in promoting a culture of inno-
vation and high performance, a strong sense of involvement on the part of company
personnel, emphasis on individual initiative and creativity, respect for the contribution
of individuals and groups, and pride in doing things right.
Organizational leaders who succeed in creating a results-oriented work cli-
mate typically are intensely people-oriented, and they are skilled users of people-
management practices that win the emotional commitment of company personnel and
inspire them to do their best.18 They understand that treating employees well generally
leads to increased teamwork, higher morale, greater loyalty, and increased employee
commitment to making a contribution. All of these foster an esprit de corps that ener-
gizes organizational members to contribute to the drive for a top-flight strategic plan,
operating excellence and better-than-average financial performance.
While leadership efforts to instill a results-oriented culture usually accentuate the
positive, there are negative reinforcers, too. Managers whose units consistently per-
form poorly have to be replaced. Low-performing workers and people who reject the
results-oriented cultural emphasis have to be weeded out or at least moved to out-of-
the-way positions. Average performers have to be candidly counseled that they have
limited career potential unless they show more progress in the form of more effort,
better skills, and ability to deliver better results.

Pushing Corrective Actions to Improve Both the Company’s

Strategy and How Well It Is Being Executed
The leadership challenge of making corrective adjustments is twofold: deciding when
adjustments are needed and deciding what adjustments to make. Both decisions are
a normal and necessary part of managing the strategy execution process, since no
scheme for implementing and executing strategy can foresee all the events and prob-
lems that will arise.19 There comes a time at every company when managers have to
fine-tune or overhaul the approaches to strategy execution and push for better results.
Clearly, when a company’s strategy execution effort is not delivering good results and
making measured progress toward operating excellence, it is the leader’s responsibility
to step forward and push corrective actions.
The process of making corrective adjustments involves sensing needs; gathering
information; developing options and exploring their pros and cons; putting forth action
proposals and partial solutions; striving for a consensus; and, finally, formally adopting
an agreed-on course of action.20 The time frame for deciding what corrective changes to
initiate can vary from a few hours or days to a few months—depending on the complexity
of the issue and the urgency of the matter. In a crisis, it is typical for leaders to have key
subordinates gather information, identify and evaluate options, and perhaps prepare a
preliminary set of recommended actions for consideration. The organizational leader then
usually meets with key subordinates and personally presides over extended discussions

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48 Part 1 Concepts and Techniques for Crafting and Executing Strategy

of the proposed responses, trying to build a quick consensus among members of the
executive inner circle. If no consensus emerges and action is required immediately, the
burden falls on the manager in charge to choose the response and urge its support.

Leading the Development of Better Competencies

and Capabilities
A company that proactively tries to strengthen its competencies and competitive capa-
bilities not only adds power to its strategy and to its potential for winning competitive
advantage but also enhances its chances for achieving good strategy execution and oper-
ating excellence. Senior management usually has to lead the strengthening effort because
competencies and competitive capabilities are spawned by the combined efforts of dif-
ferent work groups, departments, and strategic allies. The tasks of developing human
skills, knowledge bases, and intellectual assets and then integrating them to forge com-
petitively advantageous competencies and capabilities is an exercise best orchestrated
by senior managers who appreciate their significance and who have the clout to enforce
the necessary cooperation among individuals, groups, departments, and external allies.
Aside from leading efforts to strengthen existing competencies and capabilities,
effective strategy leadership also entails trying to anticipate changes in customer/
market requirements and proactively build new competencies and capabilities that hold
promise for building an enduring competitive edge over rivals. Senior managers are
in the best position to see the need and potential of such new capabilities and then to
play a lead role in the capability-building, resource-strengthening process. Proactively
building new competencies and capabilities ahead of rivals to gain a competitive edge
is strategic leadership of the best kind, but strengthening the company’s resource base in
reaction to newly developed capabilities of pioneering rivals occurs more frequently.

Displaying Ethical Integrity and Undertaking Social

Responsibility Initiatives
For an organization to avoid the pitfalls of scandal and disgrace associated with unethi-
cal strategies and operating practices, top executives must be openly and unswervingly
committed to conducting the company’s business in an ethical manner and to operating
according to socially redeeming values and to business principles. Leading the effort
to operate the company’s business in an ethically principled fashion has three pieces.
• First and foremost, the CEO and other senior executives must set an excellent
example in their own ethical behavior, demonstrating character and personal
integrity in their actions and decisions. The behavior of senior executives, always
watched carefully, sends a clear message to company personnel regarding the real
standards of personal conduct.
• Second, top executives must declare unequivocal support for high ethical stan-
dards (perhaps even expressing these standards in a company code of ethics) and
take an uncompromising stand on expecting all company personnel to adhere to
high ethical standards (and comply fully with the company’s code of ethics).
• Third, top executives must reprimand those who have been lax in enforcing ethical
compliance. Failure to act swiftly and decisively in punishing ethical misconduct
is interpreted as a lack of commitment.
Undertaking Social Responsibility Initiatives Like the observance of
ethical principles, the exercise of social responsibility requires visible and forth-
right leadership on the part of top executives. What separates companies that make a

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Chapter 2 Leading the Process of Crafting and Executing Strategy 49

sincere effort to be good corporate citizens from companies that are con-
tent to do only what is legally required are company leaders who believe Companies with socially
strongly that just making a profit is not good enough. Such leaders are com- conscious strategy leaders and
mitted to a higher standard of performance that includes social and envi- a core value of corporate social
ronmental metrics as well as financial and strategic metrics. The strength responsibility move beyond
of the commitment from the top—typically a company’s CEO and board of the rhetorical flourishes of
directors—ultimately determines whether a company will implement and corporate citizenship and enlist
execute a full-fledged strategy of social responsibility whereby it pursues the full support of company
initiatives to protect the environment, actively participate in community personnel behind social
affairs, support charitable causes, and positively impact workforce diversity responsibility initiatives
and the overall well-being of employees.

CORPORATE GOVERNANCE: THE ROLE OF THE

BOARD OF DIRECTORS IN THE STRATEGY-MAKING,
STRATEGY-EXECUTING PROCESS
Although senior managers have lead responsibility for crafting and executing a com-
pany’s strategy, it is the duty of the board of directors to exercise strong oversight
and see that the five tasks of strategic management are done in a manner that ben-
efits shareholders (in the case of investor-owned enterprises) or stakeholders (in the
case of not-for-profit organizations). In watching over management’s strategy-making,
strategy-executing actions, a company’s board of directors has four important obliga-
tions to fulfill:
1. Be inquiring critics and oversee the company’s direction, strategy, and business
approaches. Board members must ask probing questions and draw on their busi-
ness acumen to make independent judgments about whether strategy proposals
have been adequately analyzed and whether proposed strategic actions appear to
have greater promise than alternatives.
2. Evaluate the caliber of senior executives’ strategy-making and strategy-executing
skills. The board is always responsible for determining whether the current CEO is
doing a good job of strategic leadership.
3. Institute a compensation plan for top executives that rewards them for actions
and results that serve stakeholder interests, and most especially those of share-
holders. A basic principle of corporate governance is that the owners of a
corporation delegate managerial control to top management in return for com-
pensation. In their role as an agent of shareholders, top executives have a duty
to make decisions and operate the company in accord with shareholder inter-
ests. Boards of directors must develop salary and incentive compensation plans
that make it in the self-interest of executives to operate the business in a manner
that benefits the owners. It is also incumbent on the board of directors to pre-
vent management from gaining executive perks and privileges that simply line
the pockets of executives. Numerous media reports have recounted instances in
which boards of directors have gone along with opportunistic executive efforts
to secure excessive, if not downright obscene, compensation of one kind or
another (multimillion-dollar interest-free loans, personal use of corporate air-
craft, lucrative severance and retirement packages, outsized stock incentive

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50 Part 1 Concepts and Techniques for Crafting and Executing Strategy

awards, and so on). The compensation plan developed by General Electric’s

board of directors’ compensation committee makes a significant portion of the
CEO’s compensation contingent on GE’s financial performance and growth in
its stock price. In 2007, the company’s strong performance allowed GE chair-
man and CEO Jeffrey Immelt to receive total compensation of $9.1 million.
Immelt’s capabilities and track record at leading GE had regularly ranked him
as one of the world’s best CEOs by Barron’s and kept GE atop Fortune’s “Most
Admired Companies” list.
4. Oversee the company’s financial accounting and financial reporting practices.
While top executives, particularly the company’s CEO and CFO, are primarily
responsible for seeing that the company’s financial statements accurately report
the results of the company’s operations, board members have a fiduciary duty to
protect shareholders by exercising oversight of the company’s financial practices.
In addition, corporate boards must ensure that generally accepted accounting prin-
ciples (GAAP) are properly used in preparing the company’s financial statements
and determine whether proper financial controls are in place to prevent fraud and
misuse of funds.
Every corporation should have a strong, independent board of directors that (1) is
well informed about the company’s performance, (2) guides and judges the CEO and
other top executives, (3) has the courage to curb management actions they believe are
inappropriate or unduly risky, (4) certifies to shareholders that the CEO is doing what
the board expects, (5) provides insight and advice to management, and (6) is intensely
involved in debating the pros and cons of key decisions and actions.21 Boards of
directors that lack the backbone to challenge a strong-willed or imperial CEO or
that rubber-stamp most anything the CEO recommends without probing inquiry and
debate abandon their duty to represent and protect shareholder interests. The whole
fabric of effective corporate governance is undermined when boards of directors
shirk their responsibility to maintain ultimate control over the company’s strategic
direction, the major elements of its strategy, the business approaches management is
using to implement and execute the strategy, executive compensation, and the finan-
cial reporting process.

KEY POINTS
The managerial process of crafting and executing a company’s strategy consists of five
interrelated and integrated phases:
1. Developing a strategic vision of where the company needs to head and what its
future product/customer/market/technology focus should be. This managerial step
provides long-term direction, infuses the organization with a sense of purposeful
action, and communicates to stakeholders what management’s aspirations for the
company are.
2. Setting objectives and using the targeted results and outcomes as yardsticks for
measuring the company’s performance and progress. Objectives need to spell out
how much of what kind of performance by when, and they need to require a signif-
icant amount of organizational stretch. Measuring company performance entails
setting both financial objectives and strategic objectives. A balanced scorecard
approach tracks both types of objectives.

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Chapter 2 Leading the Process of Crafting and Executing Strategy 51

3. Crafting a strategy to achieve the objectives and move the company along the
strategic course that management has charted. Crafting strategy is concerned prin-
cipally with forming responses to changes under way in the external environment,
devising competitive moves and market approaches aimed at producing sustainable
competitive advantage, building competitively valuable competencies and capa-
bilities, and uniting the strategic actions initiated in various parts of the company.
The more that a company’s operations cut across different products, industries,
and geographical areas, the more that strategy making becomes a collaborative
effort involving managers and company personnel at many organizational levels.
The total strategy that emerges in such companies is really a collection of strategic
actions and business approaches initiated partly by senior company executives,
partly by the heads of major business divisions, partly by functional-area man-
agers, and partly by operating managers on the frontlines. The larger and more
diverse the operations of an enterprise, the more points of strategic initiative it has
and the more managers and employees at more levels of management that have
a relevant strategy-making role. A single-business enterprise has three levels of
strategy—business strategy for the company as a whole, functional-area strategies
for each main area within the business, and operating strategies undertaken by
lower-echelon managers to flesh out strategically significant aspects for the com-
pany’s business and functional area strategies. In diversified, multibusiness com-
panies, the strategy-making task involves four distinct types or levels of strategy:
corporate strategy for the company as a whole, business strategy (one for each
business the company has diversified into), functional-area strategies within each
business, and operating strategies. Typically, the strategy-making task is more top-
down than bottom-up, with higher-level strategies serving as the guide for devel-
oping lower-level strategies.
4. Implementing and executing the chosen strategy efficiently and effectively.
Managing the implementation and execution of strategy is an operations-
oriented, make-things-happen activity aimed at shaping the performance of core
business activities in a strategy-supportive manner. Management’s handling of
the strategy implementation process can be considered successful if things go
smoothly enough that the company meets or beats its strategic and financial
performance targets and shows good progress in achieving management’s stra-
tegic vision.
5. Evaluating performance and initiating corrective adjustments in vision, long-term
direction, objectives, strategy, or execution in light of actual experience, changing
conditions, new ideas, and new opportunities. This phase of the strategy manage-
ment process is the trigger point for deciding whether to continue or change the
company’s vision, objectives, strategy, and/or strategy execution methods.
A company’s strategic vision plus its objectives plus its strategy equals a strategic
plan for coping with industry and competitive conditions, outcompeting rivals, and
addressing the challenges and issues that stand as obstacles to the company’s success.
Successful managers have to do several things in leading the drive for good strat-
egy execution and operating excellence. First, they stay on top of things. They keep a
finger on the organization’s pulse by spending considerable time outside their offices,
listening and talking to organization members, coaching, cheerleading, and picking
up important information. Second, they are active and visible in putting constructive
pressure on the organization to achieve good results. Generally, this is best accom-
plished by promoting an esprit de corps that mobilizes and energizes organizational
members to execute strategy in a competent fashion and deliver the targeted results.
Third, they keep the organization focused on operating excellence by championing

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52 Part 1 Concepts and Techniques for Crafting and Executing Strategy

innovative ideas for improvement and promoting the use of best practices to ensure
value-creating activities are performed in a first-rate fashion. Fourth, they exert their
clout in developing competencies and competitive capabilities that enable better
execution. Fifth, they serve as a role model in displaying high ethical standards, and
they insist that company personnel conduct the company’s business ethically and in a
socially responsible manner. They demonstrate unequivocal and visible commitment
to the ethics enforcement process. Sixth and finally, when a company’s strategy execu-
tion effort is not delivering good results and the organization is not making measured
progress toward operating excellence, it is the leader’s responsibility to step forward
and push corrective actions.
Boards of directors have a duty to shareholders to play a vigilant role in oversee-
ing management’s handling of a company’s strategy-making, strategy-executing pro-
cess. A company’s board is obligated to (1) critically appraise and ultimately approve
strategic action plans; (2) evaluate the strategic leadership skills of the CEO and oth-
ers in line to succeed the incumbent CEO; (3) institute a compensation plan for top
executives that rewards them for actions and results that serve stakeholder interests,
most especially those of shareholders; and (4) ensure that the company issues accurate
financial reports and has adequate financial controls.

ASSURANCE OF LEARNING EXERCISES

1. Using the information in Table 2.2 and Table 2.3, critique the adequacy and merit of
the following vision statements, listing effective elements and shortcomings. Rank
the vision statements from best to worst once you complete your evaluation.

Vision Statement Effective Elements Shortcomings

Wells Fargo
We want to satisfy all of our customers’ financial needs, help
them succeed financially, be the premier provider of financial
services in every one of our markets, and be known as one of
America’s great companies.
Hilton Hotels Corporation
Our vision is to be the first choice of the world’s travelers. Hilton
intends to build on the rich heritage and strength of our brands
by:
• Consistently delighting our customers
• Investing in our team members
• Delivering innovative products and services
• Continuously improving performance
• Increasing shareholder value
• Creating a culture of pride
• Strengthening the loyalty of our constituents
The Dental Products Division of 3M Corporation
Become THE supplier of choice to the global dental professional
markets, providing world-class quality and innovative products.
[Note: All employees of the division wear badges bearing these
words, and whenever a new product or business procedure is
being considered, management asks, “Is this representative of
THE leading dental company?”]

( Continued )

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 Confirming Pages

Chapter 2 Leading the Process of Crafting and Executing Strategy 53

Vision Statement Effective Elements Shortcomings

H. J. Heinz Company
Be the world’s premier food company, offering nutritious,
superior tasting foods to people everywhere. Being the premier
food company does not mean being the biggest but it does
mean being the best in terms of consumer value, customer
service, employee talent, and consistent and predictable
growth.
Chevron
To be the global energy company most admired for its people,
partnership and performance. Our vision means we:
• provide energy products vital to sustainable economic
progress and human development throughout the world;
• are people and an organization with superior capabilities and
commitment;
• are the partner of choice;
• deliver world-class performance;
• earn the admiration of all our stakeholders—investors,
customers, host governments, local communities and our
employees—not only for the goals we achieve but how we
achieve them.

Sources: Company Web sites and annual reports.

2. Go to www.dell.com/speeches and read Michael Dell’s recent speeches. Do
Michael Dell’s speeches provide evidence that he is an effective leader at Dell?
Using evidence from his speeches, discuss whether he is concerned with (a) staying
on top of what is happening and identifying obstacles to good strategy execution,
(b) pushing the organization to achieve good results and operating excellence, and
(c) displaying ethical integrity and spearheading social responsibility initiatives.
3. Go to www.dell.com/leadership and read the sections dedicated to its board of
directors and corporate governance. Using evidence from these sections, discuss
whether there is effective governance at Dell in regard to (a) a critical appraisal of
strategic action plans, (b) evaluation of the strategic leadership skills of the CEO,
(c) executive compensation, and (d) accurate financial reports and controls.

EXERCISES FOR SIMULATION

PARTICIPANTS
1. Meet with your co-managers and prepare a strategic vision statement for your com-
pany. It should be no shorter than one sentence but no longer than a brief paragraph.
When you are finished, check to see if your vision statement meets the conditions for
an effectively worded strategic vision set forth in Table 2.2 and avoids the shortcom-
ings set forth in Table 2.3. If not, then revise it accordingly. What would be a good
slogan that captures the essence of your strategic vision and that could be used to help
communicate the vision to company personnel, shareholders, and other stakeholders?
2. Write a sentence that expresses your company’s strategic intent.
3. What are your company’s financial objectives? What are your company’s strategic
objectives?
4. What are the three or four key elements of your company’s strategy?

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