summary foundations of strategy Robert M. Grant 9781118914700
Executive summary – fast reading
Chapter 1 - 9
Foundations Of Strategy
Robert M. Grant
9781118914700
2nd edition 2015
English
+ test bank 40 common questions and answers
+ 50 most important core concepts explained
+ Top 10 trends and developments
+ Weblinks (new 2025)
Pages: 20
Reading time: 20 min.
, summary foundations of strategy Robert M. Grant 9781118914700
Contents
Chapter 1 Four common factors that are important for a successful strategy..........................................3
Chapter 2 Sources of profit.......................................................................................................................7
Chapter 3 External to internal environment.............................................................................................9
Chapter 4 Competitive advantage...........................................................................................................13
Chapter 5 Product lifecycle.....................................................................................................................16
Chapter 6 Managing organizational adaption.........................................................................................18
Chapter 7 Corporate strategy.................................................................................................................20
Chapter 8 Internationalization................................................................................................................23
Chapter 9 Strategic alliances...................................................................................................................26
Test bank 40 common questions and answers.......................................................................................28
1. Fundamentals of Strategy...............................................................................................................28
2. Industry and Competitive Environment..........................................................................................28
3. Resources and Competitive Advantage...........................................................................................28
4. Internationalization and Corporate Strategy...................................................................................28
50 most important core concepts explained...........................................................................................30
Top 10 trends and developments...........................................................................................................32
, summary foundations of strategy Robert M. Grant 9781118914700
Chapter 1 Four common factors that are important for a successful strategy
Four common factors that are important for a successful strategy
1) A simple, consistent and long term goal
2) Profound understanding of the competitive environment
3) Objective appraisal of resources (objectieve beoordeling van je middelen)
4) Effective implementation
Success goes to: the people that are goals focused, who know the environment, who know their own
strengths and weaknesses and who can implement their career strategies with commitment,
consistency and determination.
Strategy is the overall plan for deploying resources to establish a favourable position, while a tactic is a
scheme for a specific action. Whereas tactics are concerned with the manoeuvres to win battles,
strategy is concerned with winning the war. Strategic decisions share three common characteristics
1) They are important
2) They involve a significant commitment of resources
3) They are not easily reversible
! Corporate planning (also known as long-term planning) was developed in the late 1950s to serve the
purpose to develop a strategy more based on the long term instead of the short term. The typical format
was a five-yea corporate planning document that sets goals and objectives, forecast key economic
trends, established priorities for different products and business areas of the firm and allocated capital
expenditures. By the mid 1960s most large US and EU companies had set up a corporate planning
departments. During the 1970s and early 1980s, confidence in corporate planning and infatuation with
scientific approaches to management were severely shaken. Due to oils shocks and instability it was hard
to develop a three or five year plan.
The result was a shift in emphasis from planning to strategy making, where the focus was less on the
detailed management of companies’ growth paths than on positioning the company in markets and in
relation to competitors in order to maximize the potential for profit. This shift from corporate planning
to strategic management was associated with increasing focus on competition as the central
characteristic of the business environment and competitive advantage as the primary goal of strategy.
This also directed attention to business performance such as profit within the industry environment.
During the 1990s the focus on strategy analysis shifted from the sources of profit in the external
environment to the sources of profit within the firm. The resources and capabilities of the firm became
regarded as the main source of competitive advantage and the primary basis for formulating strategy.
The resource-bases view
“what is strategy?” “competitive strategy is about being differen.t It means deliberately choosing a
different set of activities to deliver a unique mix of value. Aka Micheal Porter” Nowadays it is important to
make less plans but more about create value for the future, for example by seeking for blue oceans. The
challenge for the 21st century are encouraging new thinking about the purpose of business. !
Strategy = is the means by which individuals or organisations achieve their objectives. It has become less
concerned with detailed plans and more about the quest for success.
- Corporate strategy: defines the scope of the firm in terms of the industries and markets in
which it competes. Which industry should we be in?
- Business strategy: is concerned with how the firm competes within a particular industry
or market. How should we compete? Also referred to as competitive strategy.
, summary foundations of strategy Robert M. Grant 9781118914700
Strategy is not about competing for today, but also concerned with competing for tomorrow. This dynamic
concept of strategy involves establishing objectives for the future and determining who they will be
achieved. Future objectives relate to the overall purpose of the firm (mission), what it seeks to become
(vision) and specific performance targets.
Strategy is located in three places: In the leads of the chief executive, senior managers and other
members of the organisation; In the top management team’s articulations of strategy in speeches and
written documents; And in the decisions through which strategy is enacted. Only last two are observable.
Hierarchy of strategy statements, made by Collis and Rukstad:
Mission statement: the basic statement of organizational purpose; it addresses why we exist
Statement of principles or values: outlines what we believe in and how we will behave
Vision statement: projects what we want to be
Strategy statements: articulates what our competitive game plan will be
C&R argue that the game plan comprise three definitive components of strategy: objectives, scope (where
we will compete), and advantages (how we will compete).
Division of strategies by Henry Mitzberg:
1) Intended strategy: is strategy as conceived of by the top management team. It is less a product
of rational deliberation and more an outcome of negotiation, bargaining and compromise among
the many individuals and groups involved in the progress.
2) Realized strategy: however, is the actual strategy that is implemented. This is always
partly related to what which was intended.
3) Emergent strategy: the primary determinant of realized strategy. The decisions that emerge
from the complex process in which individual managers interpret the intended strategy and
adapt to changing external circumstances.
Planned emergence: strategic planning combines design and emergence. The balance between the two
depends greatly upon the stability and predictability of a company’s business environment.
Bounded rationality: your decision analysis was subject to the cognitive limitations that constrain all
human beings.
Strategy improves decision making, because:
1) It simplifies by constraining the range of decision alternatives considered and by acting as a
heuristic (helpen bij het vinden) that reduces the search requires to find an acceptable solution
to a decision problem.
2) It permits the knowledge of different individuals to be pooled and integrated
3) It facilitates the use of analytic tools
The value created by a company are distributed over: employees’ (wages), lenders (interests), landlords
(rent), government (taxes) and owners (profit).
Stakeholder approach: The view of a business organization as coalitions of interest groups where top
management’s role to balance these different, often conflicting, interests.
Stakeholder analysis is a useful tool for identifying, understanding and prioritizing the needs of key
stakeholders.
Key steps in stakeholder analysis:
- Identification of the list of potential stakeholders
- Ranking stakeholders according to their importance and influence
- For each stakeholder identifying the criteria that stakeholders would use to judge
the organization’s performance or the extent to which it is meeting their
expectations
- Deciding how well the organization is doing form stakeholders perspective
- Identifying what can be done to satisfy each stakeholder
- Identifying and recording longer-term issues with individual stakeholders and stakeholders as
a group
Executive summary – fast reading
Chapter 1 - 9
Foundations Of Strategy
Robert M. Grant
9781118914700
2nd edition 2015
English
+ test bank 40 common questions and answers
+ 50 most important core concepts explained
+ Top 10 trends and developments
+ Weblinks (new 2025)
Pages: 20
Reading time: 20 min.
, summary foundations of strategy Robert M. Grant 9781118914700
Contents
Chapter 1 Four common factors that are important for a successful strategy..........................................3
Chapter 2 Sources of profit.......................................................................................................................7
Chapter 3 External to internal environment.............................................................................................9
Chapter 4 Competitive advantage...........................................................................................................13
Chapter 5 Product lifecycle.....................................................................................................................16
Chapter 6 Managing organizational adaption.........................................................................................18
Chapter 7 Corporate strategy.................................................................................................................20
Chapter 8 Internationalization................................................................................................................23
Chapter 9 Strategic alliances...................................................................................................................26
Test bank 40 common questions and answers.......................................................................................28
1. Fundamentals of Strategy...............................................................................................................28
2. Industry and Competitive Environment..........................................................................................28
3. Resources and Competitive Advantage...........................................................................................28
4. Internationalization and Corporate Strategy...................................................................................28
50 most important core concepts explained...........................................................................................30
Top 10 trends and developments...........................................................................................................32
, summary foundations of strategy Robert M. Grant 9781118914700
Chapter 1 Four common factors that are important for a successful strategy
Four common factors that are important for a successful strategy
1) A simple, consistent and long term goal
2) Profound understanding of the competitive environment
3) Objective appraisal of resources (objectieve beoordeling van je middelen)
4) Effective implementation
Success goes to: the people that are goals focused, who know the environment, who know their own
strengths and weaknesses and who can implement their career strategies with commitment,
consistency and determination.
Strategy is the overall plan for deploying resources to establish a favourable position, while a tactic is a
scheme for a specific action. Whereas tactics are concerned with the manoeuvres to win battles,
strategy is concerned with winning the war. Strategic decisions share three common characteristics
1) They are important
2) They involve a significant commitment of resources
3) They are not easily reversible
! Corporate planning (also known as long-term planning) was developed in the late 1950s to serve the
purpose to develop a strategy more based on the long term instead of the short term. The typical format
was a five-yea corporate planning document that sets goals and objectives, forecast key economic
trends, established priorities for different products and business areas of the firm and allocated capital
expenditures. By the mid 1960s most large US and EU companies had set up a corporate planning
departments. During the 1970s and early 1980s, confidence in corporate planning and infatuation with
scientific approaches to management were severely shaken. Due to oils shocks and instability it was hard
to develop a three or five year plan.
The result was a shift in emphasis from planning to strategy making, where the focus was less on the
detailed management of companies’ growth paths than on positioning the company in markets and in
relation to competitors in order to maximize the potential for profit. This shift from corporate planning
to strategic management was associated with increasing focus on competition as the central
characteristic of the business environment and competitive advantage as the primary goal of strategy.
This also directed attention to business performance such as profit within the industry environment.
During the 1990s the focus on strategy analysis shifted from the sources of profit in the external
environment to the sources of profit within the firm. The resources and capabilities of the firm became
regarded as the main source of competitive advantage and the primary basis for formulating strategy.
The resource-bases view
“what is strategy?” “competitive strategy is about being differen.t It means deliberately choosing a
different set of activities to deliver a unique mix of value. Aka Micheal Porter” Nowadays it is important to
make less plans but more about create value for the future, for example by seeking for blue oceans. The
challenge for the 21st century are encouraging new thinking about the purpose of business. !
Strategy = is the means by which individuals or organisations achieve their objectives. It has become less
concerned with detailed plans and more about the quest for success.
- Corporate strategy: defines the scope of the firm in terms of the industries and markets in
which it competes. Which industry should we be in?
- Business strategy: is concerned with how the firm competes within a particular industry
or market. How should we compete? Also referred to as competitive strategy.
, summary foundations of strategy Robert M. Grant 9781118914700
Strategy is not about competing for today, but also concerned with competing for tomorrow. This dynamic
concept of strategy involves establishing objectives for the future and determining who they will be
achieved. Future objectives relate to the overall purpose of the firm (mission), what it seeks to become
(vision) and specific performance targets.
Strategy is located in three places: In the leads of the chief executive, senior managers and other
members of the organisation; In the top management team’s articulations of strategy in speeches and
written documents; And in the decisions through which strategy is enacted. Only last two are observable.
Hierarchy of strategy statements, made by Collis and Rukstad:
Mission statement: the basic statement of organizational purpose; it addresses why we exist
Statement of principles or values: outlines what we believe in and how we will behave
Vision statement: projects what we want to be
Strategy statements: articulates what our competitive game plan will be
C&R argue that the game plan comprise three definitive components of strategy: objectives, scope (where
we will compete), and advantages (how we will compete).
Division of strategies by Henry Mitzberg:
1) Intended strategy: is strategy as conceived of by the top management team. It is less a product
of rational deliberation and more an outcome of negotiation, bargaining and compromise among
the many individuals and groups involved in the progress.
2) Realized strategy: however, is the actual strategy that is implemented. This is always
partly related to what which was intended.
3) Emergent strategy: the primary determinant of realized strategy. The decisions that emerge
from the complex process in which individual managers interpret the intended strategy and
adapt to changing external circumstances.
Planned emergence: strategic planning combines design and emergence. The balance between the two
depends greatly upon the stability and predictability of a company’s business environment.
Bounded rationality: your decision analysis was subject to the cognitive limitations that constrain all
human beings.
Strategy improves decision making, because:
1) It simplifies by constraining the range of decision alternatives considered and by acting as a
heuristic (helpen bij het vinden) that reduces the search requires to find an acceptable solution
to a decision problem.
2) It permits the knowledge of different individuals to be pooled and integrated
3) It facilitates the use of analytic tools
The value created by a company are distributed over: employees’ (wages), lenders (interests), landlords
(rent), government (taxes) and owners (profit).
Stakeholder approach: The view of a business organization as coalitions of interest groups where top
management’s role to balance these different, often conflicting, interests.
Stakeholder analysis is a useful tool for identifying, understanding and prioritizing the needs of key
stakeholders.
Key steps in stakeholder analysis:
- Identification of the list of potential stakeholders
- Ranking stakeholders according to their importance and influence
- For each stakeholder identifying the criteria that stakeholders would use to judge
the organization’s performance or the extent to which it is meeting their
expectations
- Deciding how well the organization is doing form stakeholders perspective
- Identifying what can be done to satisfy each stakeholder
- Identifying and recording longer-term issues with individual stakeholders and stakeholders as
a group
