Strategy Maps Development

Introduction

A strategy is a well laid out pattern that incorporates a company’s corporate actions and responsibility, policies, as well as its objective into a completely cohesive unit. Various aspects clearly represent a strategy map. Strategy mapping is a business framework that encompasses various core aspects that include but not limited to, the SWOT (Strength, Weakness, Opportunity, Threat) analysis, Red and Blue Ocean Strategies, STEEP (Social, Technological, Environmental, Economic, Political) analysis in addition to PMI (Plus, Minus, Interesting). The altruistic use of company retreats, focus groups, refine strategy, and market assessments contribute significantly to the business prospect. Strategy maps are impartial tools that companies employ to develop, comprehend, and deliver their own strategic story. Strategy mapping allows businesses to communicate, define, and convey their strategies. Strategy maps provide a fitting development foundation for both fiscal and non-fiscal Balanced Scorecards. The strategy monitors performance and implementation actions. They are detached tools that describe and illustrate the strategies of a company.

Analysis

The first step to a good strategic map is to explain the business mission and strategic vision.  This strategy links the current strategic map with previous strategic plans that include the missions, vision, core values, and objectives. The Glacier Inn, an ice hotel in Minnesota needed new strategies to help the hotel to break even. This step helps in endorsing and initiating the strategy map. One of the main objectives is to ensure customer satisfaction, quality service guarantee, cost efficiency, and performance monitoring (Armitage & Scholey, 2006). Notably, although the objectives are crucial for business, the main goal is to yield profits for the company without having to compromise the quality. Strategic maps create strategic management procedures that are systematic and align with administrative initiatives to achieve these targets. This clarity step should therefore, contain monetary projections and time scopes (Armitage & Scholey, 2006).

The second stage involves identifying specific objectives that segment the market in order to attain the company’s goals and objectives. For example, Glacier Inn should balance productivity development and profits growth. This is also an operation merit. Customer Solutions is whereby customers differentiate the particular company from its competitors through operation merit, client relationship, and product management. This approach focuses on choosing one of these different propositions. According to Armitage & Scholey (2006), Glacier inn uses customer solutions as their main proposition by offering friendly, time-efficient, and safe services, which ultimately lead to customer satisfaction. The remaining propositions are not to be left out but should be secondary. This, as a result, keeps customer flow and satisfaction. All organizations must pay some level of attention to each of these strategies. However, value proposition guides the business in dictating, which proposition will dominate the business market. Value Proposition information aids the company in identifying, developing, implementing, and operating productivity propositions, which focus on attaining the prime objectives of the company. The business operating excellence helps in profit maximization through price reduction, cost efficiency, and market turnover. Thus, an increase in productivity leads to high returns (Bryson, Ackermann, & Eden, 2014).

            The Porter’s five forces aid in laying out a proper business strategy that will not only bring about actual success of the company’s goals but also ensure that each aspect in the market is considered and there is a clear knowledge of the market trends (Ackermann & Eden, 2011). The management needs to understand the competition they are facing, potential new entrants in the market, substitute products, and the power of suppliers as well as the customers. These issues run down to the employee of the company in the sense that, do they understand what the company’s all year plan is and what is expected of them. The balance scorecard aids in actually visualizing the whole ideas into action. The formulation and execution phase can be frustrating hence the use of this other method to execute corporate strategy (Ackermann & Eden, 2011).

Great optimization for outcomes is publicized using the balanced scorecard. Performance management needs to be an everyday business talk and it should cease to be a one-year activity with the employee evaluation aspect only. Improved communication from management to the subordinate, frequent evaluation of results and feedback to the employees concerning their performance increases the chances of achieving the company objectives. The balanced scorecard can be looked at both the scheduling and reporting policies in which it takes the organization’s goals and fragments it into four core standpoints that include the learning and development outlook, customer perspective, business-process, and financial viewpoints.  With a view of all of these aspects, they all contribute to the major underlying issue and that is the outcome. The customers contribute to development in the sense that it becomes the company is ideal for driving its sales in order to meet the consumers’ needs. Without finances, no operational objectives can be met (Kaplan &Norton, 2004).

The scorecard keeps the employees in check in a way that they are able to know if they are on track; the performance quandary becomes outdated with tying the knot between management goals and financial objectives, which all contribute to the organization’s vision and mission (Kaplan &Norton, 2004). The employees eventually feel motivated in such a way that they get to see their individual contributions to the business. They also see how they are making a difference through achievement of various departmental goals. A foundation is well laid out for performance expectations; abstruseness concerning staff primacies becomes outdated. The status reports and the evaluations give the management a framework for coaching, appraising, and retention of employees since they are updated with all that is happening and increases the performance. This makes the balanced scorecard work for the betterment of the company. 

Conclusion

Since revenue generation is the primary focus of an organization, and with all the aspects detailed above, it is clear that with proper implementation of the strategies the organization wants to incorporate, adherence to the policies of the business is paramount. Through professional employee management using the balanced scorecard, value propositions will be implemented within a short period hence the success of the overall organization. It all starts from the top to the bottom and the other way round since the customers, the staff, and the primary contributors to the success of the company. The key to effective strategy implementation is to involve the company’s management and employees. This enables them to understand and implement these strategies accordingly. An effective strategy involves shifting the business from its current situation to a necessary and better position in future. Therefore, we can conclusively state that a strategy map identifies needful information, relationships, technology, and consumer characteristics. These characteristics define a business and turning them around to profit-making and customer satisfaction. Thus, having every employee, management and necessary stakeholders within the business should take part in strategy implementation.

References

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Ackermann, F., & Eden, C. (2011). Making strategy: Mapping out strategic success. London: SAGE Publications Ltd.

Armitage, H. M., & Scholey, C. (2006). Using strategy maps to drive performance. CMA Canada.

Bryson, J. M., Ackermann, F., & Eden, C. (2014). Visual strategy: Strategy mapping for public and nonprofit organizations. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass, a Wiley Brand.

Kaplan, R. S., & Norton, D. P. (2004). Strategy Maps: Converting Intangible Assets into Tangible Outcomes. Boston: Harvard Business Review Press.

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