0- Case Study Method

Learning by the Case Method

● Objective: Enhance learning through simulated real business situations requiring
non-operative problem-solving.
● Characteristics of Non-operative Problems:
○ There is no single, straightforward solution.
○ Involves interaction and decision-making among people.
Three Work Phases of the Case Method
1. Individual Study: Read the case individually to form an initial analysis.
2. Teamwork: Discuss and compare approaches with teammates.
3. Class Discussion: Present and defend conclusions and analyses in class.

Benefits of Case Method

1. Develop analytical skills through qualitative and quantitative evidence-based
decision-making.
2. Enhances problem-solving abilities and the rigor of thought processes.

6-Step Process for Analyzing Case Studies (Strategic/Quality Management)

1. Analyze the Situation: Identify and clearly state the problem; use SWOT analysis (Strengths,
Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats) and Porter's 5 Forces.
2. Generate Alternatives: Propose multiple solutions that align with the identified SWOT
strategies (Defensive, Offensive, Reorientation, Survival).
3. Criteria Selection for Assessment: Define criteria based on competitive advantages and
consider risks and restrictions (time, money, knowledge, and other resources).
4. Evaluate Alternatives: Assess each solution against the selected criteria using a quantitative
matrix to weigh relative importance.
5. Decision Making: Select the best alternative using a three-point strategy check (Appropriate,
Feasible, Acceptable).
6. Action Plan Formulation: Develop a detailed and specific plan for implementing the chosen
solution. Include a "bail-out plan" as a contingency.

1- The Nature of Strategic Management

Overview of Strategic Management

- Purpose: Strategic management is aimed at directing organizations through analysis, strategy
formulation, and strategy implementation, integrating the core principles of mission, vision,
and values.
- Significance: Essential for aligning organizational activities with its goals and adapting to
changing external conditions effectively.

Strategic Management Process

1. Analysis:
- Objective: Understand the internal and external environments.
- Tools: Use of SWOT analysis (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats) and other
strategic tools to capture environmental dynamics.
2. Formulation:
- Objective: Develop viable strategic options based on analytical insights.
- Approach: Differentiate between aggressive, defensive, reorientation, and survival
strategies.
- Selection Criteria: Strategies are evaluated for feasibility, sustainability, and alignment
with organizational goals.
3. Implementation:
- Objective: Execute the chosen strategy with precision.
 - Methods: Develop specific programs, establish budgets, and design procedures to
operationalize strategies.
- Review: Ongoing assessment to adjust strategies as necessary.

Core Concepts of Strategy

- Definition of Company: An entity that utilizes resources, including capital and labor, to meet
community needs while aiming for profitability and sustainable operations.
- Strategic Alignment: Involves aligning the company’s operational activities with its strategic
vision through effective management practices.

Steps in Strategic Management

1. Strategic Framework Analysis:
- Define the context in which the organization operates and formulate its strategic decisions.
2. Strategic Options Identification:
- Generate potential strategies and evaluate them against defined criteria to select the most
appropriate.
3. Strategic Implementation:
- Focus on achieving organizational policies and objectives through detailed action plans,
budgets, and procedures.
4. Control and Evaluation:
- Regularly monitor and review strategy implementation to ensure effectiveness and make
necessary adjustments.

Characteristics of Strategic Decisions

- Nature: Made in complex and unpredictable environments that require adaptability and
long-term planning.
- Impact: Decisions have widespread implications across the organization, requiring careful
consideration and robust planning.
- Challenges: Include reversibility, significant resource consumption, and the requirement for
organizational changes.

Business Policy and Strategy Relation

- Business Policy:
- Encompasses the mission (what and why), vision (future aspirations), and values
(operational principles) of the company.
- Provides a long-term perspective on the company’s goals and operational ethos.
- Specific Strategy:
- Translates the broad directives of business policy into specific objectives,
indicators, and actions for a defined period.
- Focuses on achieving targeted outcomes through structured initiatives.

Advantages and Challenges of Strategic Management

- Advantages:
- Facilitates systematic and data-driven decision-making.
- Enhances understanding and commitment among stakeholders.
- Promotes organizational learning and adaptability.
- Challenges in Implementation:
- Includes ensuring stakeholder buy-in, aligning resources with strategic objectives,
managing internal politics, and maintaining clear communication.
 2- External Assessment in Strategic Management
Overview of External Assessment in Strategic Management
- Purpose: External assessment critically analyzes the general and competitive environments
in which a company operates, identifying external forces that can affect business strategies.
- Key Components: Focuses on the general environment shaped by broader socioeconomic
and political systems, and the specific competitive environment determined by industry and
market specifics.

Tools and Models for External Assessment

1. PESTEL Analysis:
● Process: Define the geographical limits (global, national, regional, or local),
identify key forces (Political, Economic, Social, Technological,
Environmental, Legal), evaluate their impact, and identify opportunities and
threats.
● Example: Factors such as government stability, fiscal policy, and
technological advancements are weighed and scored to assess their overall
impact on competitiveness.
2. Porter’s Five Forces Model:
● Purpose: Assesses the competitive forces within an industry—new entrants,
supplier power, buyer power, threat of substitutes, and industry rivalry—to
determine industry attractiveness and potential profitability.
3. External Factor Evaluation Matrix (EFEM):
● Objective: Quantitatively assess the strength of external opportunities and
threats in specific industries like the Manila luxury hotel industry.
4. Porter Diamond Model:
● Focus: Examines national competitive advantage based on factor conditions
(manpower, infrastructure), demand conditions, related industries, and firm
strategy, structure, and rivalry.
The Abell Model:
Purpose: Defines the scope of business operations by distinguishing between industry,
market, and competition using three key dimensions:
1. Customer Groups (CG): Different groups of customers targeted by the industry.
2. Customer Needs (N): Needs that the industry’s products or services aim to fulfill.
3. Technologies (T): The various technologies employed to meet these needs.
Applications:
- Industry Level: Covers all needs of all customer groups with specific technologies.
- Business Level: Serves selected needs of specific customer groups.
- Market Level: Focuses on meeting a specific need for a specific group of customers,
regardless of the technology used.

Competitive Environment and Strategic Groups

Competitive Environment:
- From a producer’s viewpoint, it involves companies using similar production
processes or raw materials.
- From a consumer’s viewpoint, it includes companies providing substitute products
that fulfill similar customer needs.
- Strategic Group Analysis:
- Consists of companies within an industry that follow similar strategies to target the
same customer group.
Limitations and Critical Considerations
- Five Forces Model Limitations: May overlook rapid industry changes, external
influences like government policies, and the impacts of complementary products.
- Importance of Accurate Delimitation: Essential for precise competitive and strategic
analysis.
Conclusion and Wrap-Up
-Environmental Influence: The general and competitive environments profoundly
determine the attractiveness of a region or industry for business operations.
-Strategic Importance: Effective external assessment using models like PESTEL,
Porter’s Five Forces, and the Abell Model is crucial for identifying strategic
opportunities and threats, and guiding informed decision-making in strategic
management.

3- The Internal Assessment in Strategic Management

Overview of Internal Assessment in Strategic Management
-Purpose: Internal assessment helps a company understand its unique resources, capabilities,
strengths, and weaknesses, which are crucial for developing effective competitive strategies.
-Core Aspects: Focuses on identifying the company’s identity, defining its purpose beyond
profits, and evaluating internal resources to establish competitive advantages.
Key Tools and Frameworks for Internal Assessment
1. SWOT Analysis(Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats):
-Purpose: Identifies internal strengths and weaknesses along with external
opportunities and threats.
-Application: Helps in strategizing by linking internal capabilities to external
possibilities.
2. CAME Planning(Correct, Adapt, Maintain, Explore):
-Objective: Develop strategies based on the internal and external analysis results.
-Strategies: Includes aggressive, defensive, reorientation, and survival strategies
based on the company's strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats.
3. VRIO Framework(Value, Rarity, Imitability, Organization):
-Purpose: Assesses resources and capabilities to determine if they provide sustained
competitive advantage.
-Example: Evaluate factors such as brand reputation, technological assets, and
organizational processes to determine competitive potential.
4. Value Chain Analysis:
- Objective: Understand the specific activities within the company that create value
and how they contribute to competitive advantage.
-Application: Focuses on gaining cost advantage or differentiation advantage
through effective management of the value chain activities.
5. BCG Matrix (Boston Consulting Group Matrix):
-Purpose: Helps in prioritizing resources based on the analysis of business units or
products in terms of market growth rate and market share.
-Application: Assists in decision-making about resource allocation among different
business units or products.

Process of Internal Assessment

-Company’s Identity Knowledge: Involves understanding basic information about the
company such as age, size, activity field, geographic scope, ownership type, and legal
structure.
-Purpose Definition: Establishes a purpose that drives the company beyond just profits,
emphasizing societal contributions and aligning with business strategy for sustained
competitive growth.

Application of Internal Assessment Tools

-Functional Analysis: Conducts a thorough analysis across different functional areas like
sales, operations, financing, and technology using Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and
benchmarking against competition to identify strengths and weaknesses.
 -Use of Strategic Resources and Capabilities: Identifies key resources and capabilities,
assessing them for value, rarity, imitability, and organizational alignment to ascertain
competitive advantages.
-Prioritizing Resources: Utilizes tools like the BCG Matrix to decide where to allocate
resources most effectively to maximize growth and profitability.

Advantages and Limitations of Tools

SWOT Analysis:
- Advantages: Provides a clear, straightforward snapshot of the company's current
strategic position.
-Limitations: Can be overly simplistic and static; may not effectively link internal
strengths to external opportunities without additional strategic analysis.
CAME Matrix:
-Applications: Helps in strategic adjustment by categorizing necessary strategic
actions (Correct, Adapt, Maintain, Explore) based on the SWOT analysis outcomes.
Value Chain Analysis:
-Applications*: Identifies opportunities for improving efficiency and effectiveness in
specific activities that contribute to customer value and competitive advantage.

Concluding Insights
-Strategic Integration: Effective internal assessment integrates tools like SWOT,
VRIO, and the Value Chain to holistically understand and utilize the company's
internal resources for strategic planning and competitive positioning.
-Goal Orientation: Each tool within the internal assessment process has a specific
role, from identifying competitive advantages to strategically allocating resources and
forming a cohesive strategy based on internal strengths and market dynamics.

4- Strategy Analysis and Choice

Competitive Strategy and Advantage
-Definition: Competitive strategy involves the approaches a company uses to achieve superior
performance relative to competitors.
-Competitive Advantage: This is the unique set of attributes that allows a company to
outperform its competitors, typically characterized by either superior positioning or the ability
to deliver greater value at a lower cost.
Core Concepts
1. Functional Factors of Competitive Advantage:
- Marketing and Sales
- Production
- Research and Development (R&D)
- Personnel
- Corporate Resources and Finance

2.Value-Price-Cost Framework:
-Describes how companies create value that exceeds the cost of production, thereby
enabling them to charge prices that result in profitable margins.
3. Generic Competitive Strategies (Porter 2009):
- Differentiation: Creating products or services that are perceived as unique.
- Cost Leadership: Minimizing costs to offer products at the lowest possible price.
- Focus Strategy: Concentrating on a specific market niche.

Strategic Tools and Models

1. The Growth–Share Matrix (BCG):
- Helps companies analyze their portfolio of businesses or products based on market
growth and market share dynamics to determine investment priorities.
 2. McKinsey 7S Framework:
-A model that assesses organizational effectiveness by examining seven key
elements: strategy, structure, systems, shared values, skills, style, and staff.
Strategy Analysis Process
- Rational Strategy-Selection Process:
-Adequacy: Ensures the strategy aligns with the company's mission and objectives.
-Feasibility: Assesses whether the resources and capabilities are available to
implement the strategy.
-Acceptability: Evaluate if the strategy meets the expectations of stakeholders and
does not incur unacceptable costs or risks.
Implementation and Change Management
-Strategic Change: Discusses how a new strategy triggers changes within an
organization, necessitating adjustments in structure, culture, and operations.
-Implementation Keys: Success in strategy implementation is contingent upon the
effective alignment and integration of the McKinsey 7S elements.
Key Takeaways
-Strategy Formulation and Implementation Relationship: Highlighting the critical importance
of not just formulating a strategy but also effectively implementing it to ensure success.
-Common Mistakes: Discusses typical pitfalls in strategic planning and execution to caution
against potential oversights.

5- Business Configuration for strategy implementation

Overview
-Purpose: Focuses on how businesses can configure or reconfigure their organizational
structures and cultures to effectively implement strategic choices.
Learning Objectives
- Understand the role and characteristics of different organizational structures.
- Examine the relationship between strategy and structure.
- Address organizational change using the McKinsey 7S Model.
- Explore the dynamics of corporate culture and its impact on strategy implementation.
Importance of Organizational Structure
-Definition: Organizational structure determines how roles, power, and responsibilities are
assigned, controlled, and coordinated, and how information flows between levels of
management.
-Significance: A well-designed structure aligns with the company’s strategy and facilitates
effective management and operations.
Types of Organizational Structures
1. Flat Structure: Ideal for small businesses with low complexity; involves direct supervision
and minimal management layers.
2. Functional Structure: Organizes a company based on common job functions (e.g., R&D,
marketing, finance); focuses on cost efficiency and specialization.
3. Divisional Structure: Separates the company into divisions based on products, services, or
geographic locations; supports varied strategies across diverse units.
4. Matrix Structure: Combines functional and divisional structures to leverage the benefits of
both; enhances flexibility and responsiveness but can lead to conflicts.
5. Network or Adhocracy: The highly dynamic structure that connects independent units or
cells around central nodes; and promotes innovation and agility.
Strategy-Structure Relationship
-Chandler's Thesis: Asserts that structure follows strategy, suggesting that strategic changes
necessitate structural adjustments.
-Organizational Fit: The chosen structure should facilitate the implementation of the
company's strategy to enhance effectiveness and efficiency.
Organizational Change and the McKinsey 7S Model
 -McKinsey 7S Framework: Considers seven interrelated elements (strategy, structure,
systems, shared values, skills, style, staff) that need to be aligned for successful strategy
implementation.
-Change Dynamics: Strategic changes often require changes in organizational structures and
systems to support new strategic directions.
Corporate Culture
-Definition: A set of shared attitudes, values, goals, and practices that characterize an
organization.
-Influence on Strategy: Culture can significantly impact the success of strategy
implementation, requiring strategies to be culturally congruent.

Factors Affecting Corporate Culture

- External factors like industry norms and national culture.
- Internal factors including leadership behavior, organizational history, and HR policies.

Strategy and Culture Congruence

-Options for Addressing Incongruence:
1. Modify the organizational culture to align with the new strategy.
2. Adjust the strategy to fit the prevailing culture.
3. Implement changes gradually to minimize resistance.
Change Management
-Success Factors:
- Effective leadership and clear communication.
- Appropriate resource allocation.
- Involvement of key personnel and alignment of incentives.
- Use of effective control mechanisms to monitor progress.

Resistance to Change
-Challenges: Resistance can be overt or covert, and it can emerge from any level of
the organization.
-Management: Successful change management involves anticipating resistance,
engaging stakeholders, and making concerted efforts to overcome it.

6- Strategy Planning, Evaluation and Control

Overview
-Purpose: The document focuses on the essential processes and methodologies of strategic
planning, how resources are allocated, and the continuous evaluation and control mechanisms
that ensure the strategic goals of an organization are met.

Key Sections and Learning Objectives

1. Strategic Planning
-Objective: To define a clear process that aligns organizational resources and actions with
long-term goals through detailed, strategic programming.
-Components: Involves determining the specific programs, resource commitments, and
timelines required for effective strategy implementation.
2. Resource Allocation
-Objective: To discuss how budgets are formulated to align financial and physical resources
with strategic initiatives.
-Detail: Emphasizes the importance of budgeting in the strategic planning process as a tool
for executing strategies.
3. Strategic Control
-Objective: To outline the mechanisms for monitoring and adjusting strategies based on
performance outcomes.
 -Tools: Introduces the Balanced Scorecard as a comprehensive framework for strategic
control.

4. Value Creation
-Objective: To illustrate how strategic goals are transformed into operational actions that
generate value for the organization.
-Tools: Discusses the use of Strategic Maps for visualizing and planning the cause-effect
relationships between strategic objectives.

Strategic Planning and Control

Importance of Strategic Planning:
- Strategic planning is crucial as it provides a roadmap from current operations to desired
future states.
-Alden Mills and Henry Mintzberg emphasize the conceptual difference between a 'dream'
(strategy) and a 'project' (planned execution).
Formulation vs. Planning:
- Differentiates between strategic formulation—setting mid-term ambitious goals—and
strategic planning—establishing short-term actionable milestones.
- Highlights the effectiveness in achieving goals and efficiency in operations as key focus
areas.
Resource Allocation: The Budget
-Process: Explains how budgets are designed to ensure that every dollar spent is aligned with
strategic priorities.
-Approaches: Discusses proactive and reactive budgeting, emphasizing the need for budgets
to lead rather than follow strategic decisions.
Strategic Control: The Balanced Scorecard
-Introduction: Developed by Kaplan & Norton, this tool integrates financial and non-financial
performance indicators to provide a balanced view of organizational performance.
-Four Perspectives: Financial, Customer, Internal Business Processes, and Learning and
Growth, detailing how these perspectives interlink to drive strategic performance.
Value Creation: The Strategic Map
-Utility: Describes how Strategic Maps are used to link strategic objectives across different
perspectives of the Balanced Scorecard.
-Visual Tool: Helps in visualizing strategic objectives and the expected outcomes, illustrating
the pathways through which strategic goals impact financial results.
Practical Implementation
-Activities of Strategic Planning:
- Setting annual goals, defining action plans, and establishing policies that
govern the allocation of resources.
- Emphasizes the structured approach to ensuring that strategic goals are
practically achievable and aligned with the overall vision.
Evaluation and Monitoring:
- Continuous measurement and comparison of actual performance against
strategic benchmarks.
- Uses Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) to provide a quantitative basis for
performance evaluation and necessary adjustments.
Challenges and Solutions
Advantages:
- Provides a structured approach to long-term strategic management.
- Facilitates resource coordination and enhances organizational focus and learning.

Limitations:
- Can lead to bureaucratization and inflexibility.
- May be costly and could limit adaptive learning within the organization.
 Case Study Star Resolutions

Amazon: SWOT ANALYSIS

Gallina Blanca: 5 forces and 6-step process
Puma: Value Chain & VRIO
Mercadona: 6 step process
La Perla: Strategic Map
Preguntas del año pasado:

1. Briefly describe the strategic management process, and time length of each of the
steps (short, mid, long term, and why)

2. Explain what is a company from a stakeholder point of view. If you were managing
director of a mid-size company, what would be the main tasks of the job (dijo q no está
en los notes, critical thinking)

3. What is the relationship between a company’s strategy and its structure

4. Design a strategic map and a control dashboard for Osasuna Football Club 2022

Case Steps:

Set up: protagonist/industry/year/M-V-V/ how are we doing?

1. ANALYZE the situation and clearly state the problem — Environment (Pestel/Five
Forces) and Company (Swot/VRIO)

2. Generate possible ALTERNATIVES to solve the problem --- How do we compete?

Select one type of strategy: Def/Agg/Reor/Surv

3. Select the best CRITERIA for alternative assessment --- Competitive Advantages.
What is important to me? Why? / Relative weight

4. EVALUATE each alternative with every criteria --- Quantitative Matrix / Range /
Explain

5. Rationale best alternative SELECTION (Decision Stage) --- Triple Check:

Appropriate (Mission) / Feasible (Res.&Cap) / Acceptable (Stkhd)\

6. Formulate a complete and specific ACTION PLAN (Implementation Stage)