A/ ASSIGNMENT RECAP
- Prepare a 2-slide strategy recommendation for an existing company facing a strategic dilemma.
- Recommendation should address a corporate-level issue or business-level issue.
- Present a 2-minute pitch of your recommendation to the instructor
- Defend your recommendation during a 3-minute questioning period
Suggested Step:
Step 1: Identify the company and strategic dilemma
Step 2: Analysis of Current Situation
- Overview of company's current strategy and issues it faces
- Use concepts from the course to analyze the strategic dilemma
Step 3: Recommended Strategy & Rationale and Support
- Describe your recommended strategy
- Explain how it addresses the key issues identified
- Link to relevant course concepts
Step 4: (optional): Implementation Plan
- High level overview of how the strategy would be implemented
- Key activities, resources required, timeframes
Step 5: Conclusion
- Summary of key elements of your recommended strategy
- Address risks, limitations and possible extensions
Step 6: Create 2-slide strategy
- Overview of recommendation and rationale (*Visually engaging)
Step 7: Prepare for 2-minute pitch
- Summarize the key main findings, sort out the important information
- Try to pitch at least 2 times before the real pitch
Step 8: Prepare for 3-minute questioning period
- Utilize your finding and look for the weakest points in your finding
- Try to predict what will the judge ask.
B/ KEYWORD EXPLANATIONS
- Diversification - Expanding into new products, services, or markets. Helps mitigate risk.
- Vertical Integration - Taking ownership or control of suppliers or distributors. Can increase margins and reduce transaction costs.
- Generic Strategies (Cost Leadership, Differentiation, Focus) - Competitive approaches defined by Porter based on factors like price, uniqueness, and market segmentation.
- Core Competencies - Activities a firm performs exceptionally well that form basis for competitive advantage.
- Strategic Dilemma - Major, difficult strategic decision a company faces with complex trade-offs.
- PESTEL Analysis - Framework to assess external Political, Economic, Social, Technological, Environmental and Legal factors affecting an organization's strategy.
- VRIO Framework - Tool to analyze internal Resources and Capabilities in terms of Value, Rarity, Inability to Imitate, and Organization. Provides a basis for sustained competitive advantage.
C/ DETAILED OUTLINE
1. Identify the company and strategic dilemma
- Search for your favorite company or companies in an industry you are interested in or familiar with.
- Review company websites, latest annual reports, news articles, and industry analyses to identify potential companies. Consider issues facing major players.
NOTES: Try to identify and relate to the current hot issues like AI. Here are a few sources that you can relate to:
- Google: Google is facing a strategic dilemma related to the innovator's dilemma, which refers to the challenge of balancing the need to innovate with the risk of overlooking new technologies and lucrative gaps in the market. Google is facing competition from other tech giants, such as Microsoft's Bing, and the threat of AI competition looming over its search business. (1)
Example:
Company overview: Starbucks is the world's largest specialty coffee retailer, with over 30,000 stores globally and annual revenues of $26 billion (Starbucks Annual Report, 2019). The company has had incredible success with defining the café culture and positioning itself as an affordable luxury brand.
Situation: However, in recent years Starbucks has faced stagnating stagnating financial performance. due to a saturated North American market and growing competition from low-cost coffee retailers. Starbucks needs to aim to address the strategic dilemma of how it can reignite growth in this competitive and mature landscape through diversification of its business.