Answer the following Question.

• Define strategy
• Define sustainable competitive advantage
• State the four dependable strategic approaches in gaining a competitive advantage
• Explain a business model
• Discuss the three criteria for evaluating a company's strategy
• Explain the benefits of a strategic approach to managing
• State the five tasks of strategic management
• Distinguish mission, vision, and values
• Identify the elements of strategic vision
• Translate a strategic vision into objectives
• Compare corporate and business strategy
• Compare functional and operating strategies
• Describe the role and responsibility of the board of directors

Aligning Strategy to Vision

• Identify an industry's dominant economic features
• Analyze the competitive forces in an industry
• Assess how the competitive structure and forces will impact strategic decisions
• List the forces that drive change in an industry
• Ascertain the link between driving forces and strategy
• Develop strategic group maps
• Assess the strength of the strategic position of a company in an industry
• Specify the key factors for competitive success in an industry

External Forces

• Assess how well a firm's current strategy is working
• Identify a firm's resource strengths
• Discuss a firm's resource deficiencies
• Examine a firm's market opportunities
• Explore threats to a firm's future profitability
• Evaluate a company’s resource capabilities and deficiencies with a SWOT analysis
• Assess the costs and prices of a company in terms of their competitiveness
• Discuss the concept of value chain and its role in competition
• Benchmark the costs of key activities
• Use diverse strategic options for achieving cost competitiveness

Competitive Strategy

• Define the term competitive strategy
• Explain and understand the five generic types of competitive strategies
• Identify the distinctive features of each one of the five competitive strategies
• Evaluate when and how to apply each one of the five competitive strategies

Competitive Growth

• Distinguish between offensive and defensive strategies to secure competitive advantage
• Recognize first mover advantages and disadvantages
• Explain the major benefits of horizontal integration
• Explain the strategic advantages and disadvantages of vertical integration
• Evaluate the pros and cons of outsourcing
• Discuss when and how to use strategic alliances to create competitive advantage

International Strategy

• Ascertain why companies are motivated to expand internationally
• List the challenges in operating internationally
• Compare the differences between multi-country and global competition
• Identify the types of international strategies
• Recognize how and when to use the different types of international strategies
• Assess when there is a need for strategic alliances to enhance global competitiveness
• Recognize and apply strategies for industry leaders
• Apply strategies for runner-up firms
• Summarize strategies for weak businesses
• Discuss turnaround strategies

Diversification

• Identify when and how to diversify
• Apply the tests for judging a diversification move
• Identify the key diversification strategies
• Describe corporate turnaround, retrenchment, and portfolio restructuring strategies
• Examine multinational diversification strategies
• Identify corporate strategies
• Apply the three tests for evaluating industry attractiveness
• Evaluate the competitive strength of corporate business units
• Conduct a strategic and resource fit analysis
• Define the principles of strategy-implementing tasks
• Apply the principles of building core competencies and competitive capabilities
• Associate organizational structure to strategy
• Compare the pros and cons of different organizational structures
• Recognize the trends in organizational structures of the future

Implementing Strategy

• Evaluate how to reallocate resources to match the budgetary and staffing requirements of a new strategy
• Establish strategy-supporting policies and procedures
• Institute best practices and mechanisms for continuous improvement
• Install support systems to enable personnel to perform their tasks
• Employ motivational practices and incentives to enhance employee commitment to strategy
• Define corporate culture
• Realize the role that corporate culture plays in strategy
• Identify the signs of strong and weak cultures
• Create a fit between culture and strategy
• Exert strategic leadership
• Trace where ethical standards come from
• Identify the three categories of management morality
• List the drivers of unethical strategies and behavior
• Discover approaches to managing a company’s ethical conduct
• Evaluate social and corporate responsibility