Page 84 - The Handbook for Quality Management a Complete Guide to Operational Excellence

70 I n t e g r a t e d P l a n n i n g S t r a t e g i c P l a n n i n g 71

be best broken into smaller projects aligned with a specific substrategy and
executed at lower levels of the organization.

Strategic Styles
Strategic plans are necessarily specific to a particular organization, at a par-
ticular time in its life cycle. What works for a Fortune 100 firm in a devel-
oped market will not likely apply directly to a start-up in a niche market.
Reeves et al. (2012) define four broad categories of strategic style:

1. Classical. This traditional approach to defining longer-term plans
should be limited to organizations in fairly predictable, mature
environments. Examples include oil exploration and production, air
freight/logistics, beverages, utilities, paper products, and tobacco.

2. Adaptive. This flexible approach fosters experimentation to develop
strategy within unpredictable environments in which you have
little ability to change. Many of today’s markets are continually
changing due to competition, innovation, and/or economic

uncertainty, making some aspects of a strategic plan obsolete or
irrelevant after perhaps only a few months. In these environments,
firms must become learning organizations, essentially integrating
their strategic planning with operations to quickly develop and
then track results of each strategic iteration. Examples include
biotechnology, communications equipment, specialty retail, and
computer hardware.
3. Shaping. When the environment is unpredictable, but you have
some ability to change the environment, a shaping strategy is
recommended. In this case, the organization develops a strategy
that seeks to influence the market, such as through innovation.
This may disrupt a stagnant market or a fragmented market, but in
either case the objective is to redefine the market to the company’s
advantage. The authors cite Facebook as an example of successful
deployment of the shaping strategy. Their ability to overtake an
initially dominant competitor in MySpace was complemented
by redefining the social media space with applications, such as
games. Other examples include software development, airlines,
catalog retail, consumer services, and wireless services.
4. Visionary. When an organization can both shape the environment
and reliably predict the future, they can develop bold and decisive
plans to create new markets or redefine an organization. Since the
market is predictable, the organization can take the time and commit
resources to develop and execute a complete plan. The authors cite
examples such as XM satellite radio, UPS as “the enablers of global
e-commerce,” aerospace and defense, and food products.

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