MHJ
Literature reviews, by category
Richard Koch:
The Financial Times Guide to Strategy

Rating: * * * *

A simple and practical book about strategy and strategic planning to the general manager. The book has three parts: The planning processes and possibilities, the role of strategy in corporations and business units and a good glossary of people, terms and concepts of strategy.
The first part takes a case-company through the most common strategic planning and analyzing processes, from SWOT’s to BCG matrix to growth potential analysis. The practical approach is extremely suitable to functioning managers in existing organizations - the theoric background is left with far less attention.
For me the second part has a very important and well-illustrated theme: the difference between business-unit strategy and corporate strategy. Koch makes a case of corporate strategic centers as value-destroying rather than value-creating in all conditions - controlling, designing, even if the center is not engaging itself in any kind of strategic planning of the business processes (of course - then you can fire half the people as they’re not needed).
The third part is a useful reference on the basic ideas and history of strategy and strategic methods. Once again, knowing the development history of the field enables the observer to judge the value of existing theories and to even make assumptions of future developments in the field.

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