Analyse the strategy of a company of your choice from the perspective of any ONE model or concepts introduced in lectures.
Model:henry mintzberg 5ps
Proper and full Harvard referencing is essential.
Question-specific advice
This is an opportunity to examine a real company of your choice and research their strategy with specific reference to your chosen topic(s).
If you choose one of the companies or industries examined in tutorials, you will of course be expected to use much more than just the case study material!
I strongly suggest that you start by choosing a company in which you are personally interested, and ask yourself the following questions to get you started:
• Can I find sufficient information about this company?
o Company reports?
o Academic sources?
o Quality media sources
• Do they explicitly state what their strategy is?
o If they do, do you agree that it is appropriate, and why?
o Do they appear to be doing what they claim to be doing?
o If they do not, why not?
• What are independent sources (academic, media…) saying about them? (See below).
Based on the above, you can then choose the model(s) and/or framework(s) you consider most appropriate to help you examine their strategy.
I suggest you start by reading the Chairman’s and Chief Executive’s statements in the company annual report (if appropriate and available). There is no need to read the entire report, the statements above (often referred to as ‘letter to shareholders’ or ‘Chairman’s report’) should be adequate, unless you need more detail in specific areas such as Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) reports etc. You might also like to look back at previous years’ reports – is their strategy consistent, or has it changed. Why?
I also suggest that you look at quality media such as good newspapers (eg the Financial Times, Telegraph, Independent, Guardian) and periodicals (such as The Economist). Access to their sites (which are searchable) is free via the Library electronic sources.