MGT 599 Week 1 Strategy: Foundations

Strategic Foundation

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Strategic Foundation

According to (Elsie, 2011), a strategy is a broad, wide plan that consists of several tactics. A strategy draws towards defining the “What”, that means it brings forth a clear answer on what a company is trying to achieve. Tactics are plans or a task that can be done at that time, they can be inclusive of a wider strategy. Tactics strive to answer the “how”, which means it gives an answer on how the company will achieve their set of goals.

The purpose of a strategy in a company is to find out the goals that improve the company’s administration and planning of resources broadly, which are usually short term. It helps the company in giving it a certain path or acts as a bridge. Whereas the purpose of a tactic in a company is to put in use the resources in order to accomplish the sub goals that work coherently with the identified mission and are usually a long term (McGuigan & Moyer, 2013).

Strategy roles have specific people who are able to alter with the company’s resources because they have knowledge on how tactics work consistently in order to fulfill the goals of the company whereas tactics have specific skilled experts that are able to find ways and work with resources that have been set aside for them to fulfill the goals of the company that were set out for them.

As shared by (Safco, 2010), strategy and tactics have a difference when it comes to accountability. Strategies have the responsibility to the general well-being of the company and they are not able to be altered frequently whereas tactics are held responsible to the resources that have been put for them to fulfill, they are easily altered because of its flexibility according to the conditions and state of the market.

Strategy and tactics have different methods that help them identify the company goals. Strategies not only use experiences but they also put into consideration the analyzed historical results, the thoughts and communication in order to set their goals whereas for tactics the look into experiences, the best performance in the company, the set of actions acted on the plans to in order to achieve the goals of the company.

Strategy and tactics have different ways of delivery. Strategies give out a clear identified and sorted out company goals, list of steps taken, a direction, a map and the important accomplishment measurements. Tactics on the other hand is responsible for giving out a defined achievable goal as a delivery by using a person or duration of time to implement the company’s goal.

A real business world example that reflects on of the maxim’s from Sir Liddell-Hart’s article is Apple. The products that Apple create are in demand in that the people behind its success also want to use it. The technology behind it is overwhelmingly impressive. The products of Apple are user friendly. The design used in their software setting and user interface can be understood by the customers. Apple products are also simple and precise. It makes the work of the customer easy. Their ability to give out offers by giving customers good services.

Apple is a company that focuses on improving their own products and not reinventing products. The products from Apple that are currently released are usually a better version of the old model. It is a company that has it ahead of its competitors by a couple of years. The designers involved always work on products that should be released within a time frame of the set years and not because they have their competitors releasing their own versions.

Apple Company thus fulfills the Sir Liddell-Hart’s maxim that states “Exploit the line of least resistance- so long as it can lead you to any objective that would contribute to your underlying object”. They were able to identify the needs of their customers and used their employees to find that out, thus seizing opportunity. After their first products hit the market, they became a success because they were able to satisfy the customer’s specifications and also giving them good services.

References

L Safeco,(2010), Tactics, tools and strategies for business success: The social Media Bible.

J R McGuigan, R C Moyer, (2013), Managerial economics: Strategies and Tactics.

Erica Olsen, (2011), Strategic Planning kit For Dummies, 2nd Edition.