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18 PART 1 • OVERVIEW OF STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT

business failure, the planning concepts and tools described in this text can yield substantial
financial benefits for any organization. An excellent Web site for businesses engaged in
strategic planning is www.checkmateplan.com.

Nonfinancial Benefits
Besides helping firms avoid financial demise, strategic management offers other tangible
benefits, such as an enhanced awareness of external threats, an improved understanding of
competitors’ strategies, increased employee productivity, reduced resistance to change,
and a clearer understanding of performance–reward relationships. Strategic management
enhances the problem-prevention capabilities of organizations because it promotes interac-
tion among managers at all divisional and functional levels. Firms that have nurtured their
managers and employees, shared organizational objectives with them, empowered them to
help improve the product or service, and recognized their contributions can turn to them
for help in a pinch because of this interaction.
In addition to empowering managers and employees, strategic management often
brings order and discipline to an otherwise floundering firm. It can be the beginning of
an efficient and effective managerial system. Strategic management may renew confi-
dence in the current business strategy or point to the need for corrective actions. The
strategic-management process provides a basis for identifying and rationalizing the need
for change to all managers and employees of a firm; it helps them view change as an
opportunity rather than as a threat.
Greenley stated that strategic management offers the following benefits:

1. It allows for identification, prioritization, and exploitation of opportunities.
2. It provides an objective view of management problems.
3. It represents a framework for improved coordination and control of activities.
4. It minimizes the effects of adverse conditions and changes.
5. It allows major decisions to better support established objectives.
6. It allows more effective allocation of time and resources to identified opportunities.
7. It allows fewer resources and less time to be devoted to correcting erroneous
or ad hoc decisions.
8. It creates a framework for internal communication among personnel.
9. It helps integrate the behavior of individuals into a total effort.
10. It provides a basis for clarifying individual responsibilities.
11. It encourages forward thinking.
12. It provides a cooperative, integrated, and enthusiastic approach to tackling problems
and opportunities.
13. It encourages a favorable attitude toward change.
14. It gives a degree of discipline and formality to the management of a business. 18

Why Some Firms Do No Strategic Planning

Some firms do not engage in strategic planning, and some firms do strategic planning but
receive no support from managers and employees. Some reasons for poor or no strategic
planning are as follows:
• Lack of knowledge or experience in strategic planning—No training in strategic
planning.
• Poor reward structures—When an organization assumes success, it often fails to
reward success. When failure occurs, then the firm may punish.
• Firefighting—An organization can be so deeply embroiled in resolving crises and
firefighting that it reserves no time for planning.
• Waste of time—Some firms see planning as a waste of time because no marketable
product is produced. Time spent on planning is an investment.
• Too expensive—Some organizations see planning as too expensive in time and
money.
• Laziness—People may not want to put forth the effort needed to formulate a plan.