MGT 4315/6318: Strategic Management

Leadership is the habit of making good choices. Even in difficult and uncertain circumstances, the most effective leaders focus their attention and overcome entrenched patterns of behavior to push an organization to new heights of success. This capability is no fluke: the latest research on the brain shows that we can pinpoint the mental activity associated with it-and cultivate it for our benefit. In this book, Art Kleiner, a strategy expert; Jeffrey Schwartz, a research psychiatrist; and Josie Thomson, an executive coach, give a transformative explanation of how cutting-edge neuroscience can help business leaders set a course toward better management. Mapping the functions of a manager onto established patterns of mental activity, they identify crucial brain circuits and their parallels in organizational culture. Strategic leaders, they show, play the role of wise advocates: able to go beyond day-to-day transactional behavior to a longer-term, broader perspective that articulates their organization's deeper purpose. True leaders can play this influencer role in an organization because they have cultivated similar self-reflective habits in their own minds. Providing a powerful guide to decision strategies and their consequences, The Wise Advocate helps managers find their own inner voice and then make that voice ring out loud and clear, with a four-step program for practice and catalytic implications for management strategy, executive education, and business results.

Corporate strategy differs from business strategy by the fact that the former aims at building a corporate advantage, while the latter a competitive advantage. Both are intertwined and are crafted not only to find an alignment with the environmental context and company's resources, but also with the ownership model. Two are the main groups of decisions that characterize corporate strategy: Where to invest or divest? How to manage the business portfolio? This book, rooted in academic research, the teaching experiences of the authors, and their direct understanding of the corporate world, consists of seventeen chapters, which allow readers to learn how to analyze and evaluate a corporate strategy; how to make and implement growth or divestiture decisions; how to manage M&A processes; how to design the organizational structure to translate a portfolio strategy into sound results; how to implement an effective corporate governance, and how to guide a strategic and organizational change. Written for students, managers, entrepreneurs, owners, board members, and advisors, this book provides concepts, methods and practices to make good corporate strategy decisions in firms of any size, whose boundaries can cross multiples industries and geographies.

Traditionally, analysis of strategic management has divided the focus between a business and corporate level. This text goes beyond that to help readers recognize the interplay of the "how" and "which" of strategy. It embraces the integrated nature of learning to avoid the compartmentalization of strategy concepts.  Strategic Management in Emerging Markets: Aligning Business and Corporate Strategyhas three uniquely valuable components. First, it identifies and integrates corporate and business strategy levels along with their co-evolution; enabling readers to better understand strategic alignment. Secondly, there is an explicit presentation of strategy for emerging markets which utilizes original theory and cases to help readers to better identify and succeed in high growth business contexts. Thirdly, it presents an integrative and comprehensive case study of an international corporation, Inchcape Inc., which is designed specifically to facilitate cumulative and holistic learning.  The book focuses on newer aspects of strategy theory and the hallmarks of emerging markets, such as dynamic capabilities, environmental turbulence, and the difficulties associated with strategic choice and execution in complex business environments. An appreciation of the role of megatrends is also a key aspect since emerging markets evolve at much faster rates than slower growth developed economies. Appealing to practitioners and students of strategic management and international business, the book bridges conceptual and practical realms of strategy generating intellectual synergies for the reader and enhancing the learning experience.

Globalization stems from the verb “to globalize”, which embodies the concept of international interdependence and influence between various social and economic systems. In an increasingly globalized market environment, there is an impetus for many firms to look to foreign markets in order to maintain competitive advantage. Over recent years, it has been possible to see dramatic changes that have strong impacts on all businesses.Strategic process can provide an overall strategic direction to the management of an organization, and gives a specific direction to areas like financial strategy, marketing strategy, organizational development strategy and human resources strategy, in order to achieve success.Innovation is the foundation of economic growth and corporate prosperity.Finally, entrepreneurship provides all the necessary mobilization for this growth and prosperity.In this respect, this book provides scientific evidence and direction to businesses competing in the contemporary competitive and changing environment. As such, it is an essential reference source, building on the available literature in the field of globalization, strategic management and innovation use, while providing for further research opportunities in this dynamic field. The book presents research and paradigms that transcend classical theory in order to examine how business practice is positively affected by these conditions. Across a multitude of sectors and organisational types, scholars of different business specialisations set the theoretical foundations of contemporary thinking and present their practical implementations.