Aligning Processes to Strategy

According to Morrison et al, Strategic alignment is the mechanism through which the organization can align its business processes, resources and strategies to achieve the organizational objectives. Organizations face increased competition from local as well global companies. In order to ensure their survival and long-term success, these companies need to constantly review and redefine their strategies to attract the customers.

Organizations are facing extremely challenging competitive environment in which they need to develop a competitive advantage to remain successful. This competitive advantage is that one thing they do better than their competitors and it is called as the core competence. There are three generic business strategies: low cost leadership adopted by Wal-mart, product differentiation adopted by Rolex and Focus strategy adopted by sports channel companies. There are two schools of thought on how organizations formulate strategies: rational school and incremental school. Rational school thinks strategy should be planned in advance and then implemented. The incremental school thinks strategies can be developed from trying to make changes. The strategy adopted by the organization depends on the factors like size of the organization, management style and complexity of environment. Strategies are defined and reviewed based on the mission and vision statement of the organization. Organization can conduct internal and external analysis to understand the impact of their strategies in real environment.

For senior management in most organizations, strategic planning and mission and vision statements are most important tools. From the given article we understood the key features and issues faced while formulating and implementing strategies. It also talks about how to evaluate the strategy in terms resources and time-scales. Strategies are the links between the business process and resources to organizational objectives.