LDR 660 - Strategic Issues

Editor's Notes

• #3: Pulitzer prize winner, historian, political scientist and leadership authority James MacGregor Burns Transformational Leadership Theory appeals to the "high road" in developing social values and individual purpose. His 1978 work published by Harper and Row is a classic and excellent read, from which we get this direct quote.
• #4: When analyzing history, the current environments in which our organizations operate, and visioning a future, we must have a clear understanding of a firm’s resources. Although you might not know it from how many American businesses in particular operate, the single most important resource in every organization is the people.The Resource Based View, or RBV is an important theoretical underpinning, at least implicitly, of the most widely used public strategic management models.But most public strategic management models do not show how key resources should link directly to achieving organizational goals or aspirations – that is, they do not show how to create a “livelihood scheme.”
• #5: Bryson uses the term Livelihood Scheme, which is simply another variation of a business model of how the organization operates. Resource C in the book outlines how to develop a livelihood scheme.Critical success factors are the actions an organization must do, criteria they must meet, or performance levels that must be achieved to meet stakeholder needs. In a simple sense resources are all of the inputs needed to produce the outcome. In a broader sense it goes beyond time, talent and treasure, and must include things like physical structures, organizational design and processes. You should understand competencies, the abilities to perform actions and processes the organization can manage which lead to the desired outcomes. Distinctive competencies lead to competitive advantage, and particularly in a knowledge society is why people are the most important resource in the organization. In developing a strategic plan, understanding the core competency of the organization is required in meeting objectives. Core distinctive competency helps add value over competitors. Threshold competencies are skill sets that must be present for organizational survival, such as accounting, financial management, human resources and IT, though depending on the size of the organization many of those competencies are outsourced these days.
• #6: As with anything a good graphic is better than pages of text and this one comes directly from Bryson. And by undertaking this kind of organizational review we have a better change of creating a strategic plan, and managing strategically to achieve our stated objectives. Additionally we may find areas of expertise that we’re missing and that we need to develop to be relevant as an organization in the not too distant future.
• #7: Strategic Issues are the fundamental policy choices or challenges facing the organization.They arise on the organization’s boundaries with its environment. They are something the organization can do something about, although it may not be easyThey typically are:Boundary crossingResource intensivePolitically loadedIrreversible Highly consequential
• #8: My personal experience with many nonprofit organizations is that they consider their primary stakeholder to be the clients whom they serve. In reality the most important “client” for any organization is the one who provides the funding. So in a nonprofit that would be the donors, because without their funding the organization ceases to exist. In a for-profit world it’s the customers who purchase the products and services. And in a global economy regardless of market size very few organizations are the sole provider of a product or service as we have many more competitors a buyer can chose from.
• #9: From the work by Bryson, as we arrive at an overarching organizational strategy, there must be subunit strategies below for each department or unit, which then lead the program, product or services offered into the marketplace, and the internal functional strategies which enable the organization to operate. We’ve talked about this previously, but depending on the model you’re using there are varying terms that describe the same thing essentially. So you have to make sure that within your team everyone holds the same meanings whether you’re discussing goals, strategies, objectives, tactics, action plans or any of a variety of strategic planning terms.
• #10: From both week one in class, and from your discussion thread on various strategic planning models you should have come to the understanding that there are various terms used by different experts. Clarifying what these terms mean to you, and more importantly to those you’re working with is key to being on the same page. This version is commonly referred to as a combination of Hoshin Kanri and Balanced Scorecard. As Bryson discusses, strategies are not tactics. Tactics are short term adaptive actions and reactions used to accomplish limited objectives. Strategies provide a continuing basis for ordering the adaptations to more broadly conceived purposes.
• #11: Creating a strategic plan, without putting measurements in place is a complete waste of time. Within the overriding goal there must be a measure of success. If we choose too many strategies which lead us towards the goal, we won’t be able to focus enough on any one objective and something will fall through the cracks leading to disappointment and failure. We’ve previously talked about setting up small wins, places that accomplishment can be celebrated. So as we move strategies into the tactical or actions level we need to set targets that can be measured. Otherwise how do we know we’ve arrived at our objective?
• #12: How we bring the team, or the entire organization together are through the discussion and communication of issues and ideas that reach to the heart of each participant in some way. As all stakeholders don’t have identical needs or worldviews, this requires leadership to understand what each level of stakeholder requires. And what is universal among stakeholder groups. This isn’t to say that you’re going to try to be all things to all people, because that’s a clear recipe for failure.Bryson suggests framing strategic issues as questions, in part because if there isn’t anything we can do about the issue, then it’s not really strategic for our organization. Secondly, an effective strategic plan has to have action, or activities or it’s a waste of time. So framing issues as a questions allows us to better apply tactics that answer the question. Thirdly, it helps us focus the organization on what we can control and do something about. If you’ve looked at funnel theory previously in any of your classes, we continue to narrow down to a point where we make choices about the activities that will lead us to accomplishing our mission and vision.
• #13: Strategic issues sometimes are discussed during the normal course of our daily activities in the organization, which is another reason why a strategic plan should be a living, breathing document. Particularly in a volatile global economy or political marketplace where adaptability and the need to change course can happen abruptly. The direct approach is appropriate when there is a lack of clarity about goals and vision. The goals approach is more traditional, and once goals and objectives have been set then the issues arise in discussion of how to meet those goals. In some cases we’ll have a prior strategic plan with a balanced scorecard approach to what we’ve been measuring and so can adjust for the new direction. If we have a clear vision of success for what the organization will look like in the future, then the issues will arise out getting from where we are now, to fulfilling that vision.The indirect approach most often comes about when members of the team, and or leadership, are unclear about direction beyond knowing that some level of change is needed. Oval Mapping, or the Action Oriented Strategy mapping approach applies key words and arrow diagrams to help visualize the cause and effect or influence relationships that to strategic issues. The tensions approach we’ll discuss further in a moment. The systems analysis approach is highly complex and requires expertise in the field as well as longer meeting and planning time. And finally from this Bryson list, the alignment approach simply helps clarify where gaps and conflicts exist between where we want to be and how we operate now. Rummler and Brache’s Improving Performance (Jossey-Bass, 1995) is an excellent guide for mapping out the white spaces in or organizations that prevent effective flow of information and resources across the firm.
• #14: How often have we heard the phrase “but that’s not how we do it here,” or “this is how we’ve operated for more than 20 years,”. That’s why the old rule of “if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” is a crutch that inhibits organizational change and growth. More appropriately, as multiple researchers have shown, “First break all the rules,” as in book subtitle from the 12 rules of management from Gallup which we’ve discussed in previous classes.
• #15: Depending on the size of the organization and the number of participants on the planning team, you’re bound to have some conflict in these discussions. But if you remember our previous discussions from Heifetz and Bryson, constructive conflict is absolutely necessary for organizational growth and relationship development.
• #16: The appreciative inquiry approach to organizational change, developed by David Cooperrider, advises focusing on what’s working within the organization, as opposed to many others who want to focus on what’s not working. Bryson’s advising us to create effective strategies that (slide). And in particular creating value has to be the benchmark. If we’re not creating value for our customers, our community, our stakeholders, then what’s the point?
• #17: Whatever issues the organization faces are in some ways related to each other. This issue map ties back to the Penndot Case Study we looked at in week 1. Analyzing the issues will help you understand which issues are crucial. It will also help you figure out where to start and begin to develop effective strategies for the organization
• #18: Building our strategies off our competencies and distinct competencies builds value creation through our actions towards achieving our mission.
• #19: Again from the Department of why as Daniel Pink would say, determining the purpose and continually asking why are we doing this, why would we do that helps focus organizational strategies in ways that will appeal to the majority of stakeholders.
• #20: As we’re developing strategies and clarifying our purposes, the internal environmental scan should reveal whether we’re dealing with development or non-developmental issues.
• #21: The failures involve not heading in the right direction They typically occur when the environment is misread They also can occur when process management and process improvement activities extend beyond their area of effectiveness – driving out loose coupling and knowledge exploration in the interests of tight coupling and knowledge exploitation