Case Analysis: Whither an MBA at Strutledge MGMT 5333.900 September 13, 2013 Case Analysis: Whither an MBA at Strutledge I. Setting The issues concerning the case analysis takes place at a small private liberal arts school named Strutledge. The school is located within 50 miles of a major urban area in the southeast United States. The Board of Regents is considering establishing an MBA program. The key players in this case include the Dean of the school who sees an opportunity in establishing an MBA program, the faculty which would comprise of instructors of local industry, a major state-funded school located nearby which does offer an …show more content…
2. How should Strutledge go about making a strategic decision such as this? There is no cookie cutter best way to design a product or service, or manage operations. A strategic decision depends on the firm’s objectives, resources, and competencies. First, a strategy which provides direction for achieving the mission must be developed. Strategy formulation consists of five steps: defining a primary task, assessing core competencies, determining order winners and order qualifiers, positioning the firm, and deploying strategy. Strutledge aims to increase student enrollment. However the primary task cannot be defined too broadly nor narrowly. For example, the school should not target the population of the immediate community, that would be too narrow a customer pool. Also, they cannot intend to have open enrollment for all who apply. That would be too broad and it could cause loss of the school reputation of being a private school. They must define what types of students they are looking to serve. The school must also evaluate themselves to identify its core competencies. This is what it does better than any other school. Strutledge must be aware of its resources and how and what the school is best known for. For instance, they do not
Smiley, a buyer from Carrefour Fashions, entered the store of a rival firm, Boulevard Boutique. The reason for his visit was to find out about the latest lines that Boulevard was carrying. Once Smiley entered the store he was recognized by Maldini, the store manager of Boulevard, who immediately called the store detective and told him to keep an eye on Smiley. Maldini then called the police, notifying them that he had a shoplifter in the store. Smiley never tried to leave, believing that Rocco, the store detective, would not permit him to do so. Once the police took Smiley to the station he explained the situation and was released.
Much of what matters most in education, however, is difficult if not impossible to quantify and measure because it involves the unknown potential futures of students. Colleges operate as nonprofit or public entities to prevent students’ futures from being sacrificed to enrich an investor who wants a bigger, faster financial return. Operating as a nonprofit does not guarantee that students are treated well, but it increases their chances by eliminating owner and investor pressures.
b.What are the amounts and timing of the acquisition investment’s free cash flow from 2013 through 2022?
Strategy formulation has been acknowledged as one of the most crucial factors of ensuring the long-term growth of the business. However, the manner in which strategy is formulated, and most importantly, the nature of the strategy chosen for the company determines its future position in the marketplace (Grant, 2005).
The following are the factors that created an opportunity for Bob Reiss and TV Guide game:
We have identified three ongoing processes- analyses, decisions, and actions- that are central to strategic management. In practice, these three processes – often referred to as strategy analysis, strategy formulation, and strategy implementation – are highly interdependent and do not take place one after the other in a sequential fashion in most companies.
There are five components within a well- developed strategy. Market segments its competition when it plans to enter. Decisions about an organization’s strategic plan should focus on management’s view of the company’s mission or vision. Its various activities define the essential nature of what the company is should be like. A marketing strategy is composed of several related elements. Businesses are created from creativity and ideas. Many new business plans fail, because there is lack of execution. You need to execute in all areas of your business. Implementing and executing the chosen strategy and evaluating performance all involve marketing and
(P1.1) In formulating a business strategy, it is a crucial factor to determine what the organization’s mission, vision, objectives and core competencies are because it sets an idea on what the organization should do and what purpose do they have in the industry to contribute to their customers. It also helps what markets should they target and what action should they plan to have a competitive advantage.
7. Formulate strategic options and select the appropriate strategies – The next step is to evaluate strategic options and then prepare a game plan designed to achieve the company’s mission, goals, and objectives such as increasing sales in a particular segment (either by growing the segment or taking a share from the competition) or penetrating a completely new segment (either by promoting the product on its existing attributes or by repositioning the product for that segment).
A strategy is said to be a plan that is made for the long term success of a product or brand. It is extremely important to have a strategy in order to figure out a direction towards which any company is able to focus all its resources efficiently and achieve desired outcomes. Formulating effective strategies is a considerably long process in itself that combines analysing several factors, situations and issues that are already present in a company and looking to improve on them alongside trying to implement various innovations and ideas to collectively create a direction towards which they can move and direct the resources available to them.
Strategic planning involves taking information from the environment and deciding upon an organizational mission, and upon objectives, strategies, and a strategic architecture. There are many different ways to go about deciding on your mission. Michael Porter, a researcher from Harvard, had a few ways for developing frameworks for developing an organization’s strategy.
The first step in the strategic management process is to establish a mission and vision for your organization. When establishing an organizations mission, the intention is to display and express the justification of your business. Furthermore, the vision should explain what the organization plans to accomplish and become in the future (Kinichi and Williams, 2016).
Strategic planning is central to management study. It defines the long term direction for the company and all other business functions orbit around their established strategies. This article studies how a company formulates business-level strategies, optimize their competitive positioning and obtain a competitive advantage over their rivals.
Strength: It is easy to start a new MBA course or Master of Science in Strutledge being a small private school. Local industry supplements much needed faculty expertise for the new courses. The state budget cut and overworked professor at the state university opens the door for a Strutledge into the MBA market.
Strategic planning involves making decisions about the organization’s long-term goals and strategies and how the organization decides to implement their goals (Bateman, Snell, Konopaske, pg. 113). Strategies help organizations to have a clear perspective on how to go about accomplishing the goals they have in place. All organizations have a clear vision of what their mission and purpose as a company is, they know how to fulfill the mission, vision, and purpose and they know how to ensure that they accomplish all their goals. However, the route the organization takes to define these things determines how effective they will be.