University of Sunderland
School of Computing and Technology
Assignment for Module
COMM1H

Quality and Information Systems Strategies

IT strategic plans, a “mathematical” function of the type of organisation
and the national culture?

Author:

 Florian Konow

Programme: MSc ITM
Hand-in Date: 20th April 2005

Content:

1. Introduction ... 1

2. Strategy and Information Systems  ... 1
2.1 Strategy ... 1
2.2 Strategic Plans  ... 3
2.3 IT/IS Strategy – IT/IS Strategic Plans  ... 3

3. Strategy and the Organisation ... 4
3.1 Competitive Position ... 4
3.2 Stages of Growth ... 5

4. Strategy and National Culture  ... 7
4.1 Hofstede’s Dimensions ... 7
4.2 Trompenaars and Hampden-Turner’s Dimensions  ... 8
4.3 Implications for Strategy  ... 8

5. Conclusion ... 9

6. References ... 10

1. Introduction

Starting from the management perspective, which might be the most reasonable answer for mostly any question? 

Well, it depends... . 

In the same way as this beginning matches to the stated question there will be hardly any management question one could not start to answer with these three words. The same applies to the definition of strategy, or strategic plans. Even academic literature, up to today, did not get to one single agreement on the definition of strategy (Robson, 1997; Mintzberg et al., 1998). But this does not mean that strategies lack in importance, the opposite is the case. Literature provides evidence of the importance of strategy (e.g. Robbins and Coulter, 2002; Miller and Cardinal, 1994; Robson, 1997).

Strategy depends highly on the basis, the viewpoints and the backgrounds. Thinking of IT as the basis, the type of organisation as the point of view and the national culture as the background one could argue that IT strategic plans are a function of the type of organisation making them and the culture of the home country.

The subsequent examinations will follow up on this statement with a literature review. To ensure the applicability of the discussion initially the terms of strategy, strategic plans and IS strategy will be examined. The ensuing attention will be paid to different strategy determining techniques in the context of organisations. Finally the national culture and its relationship towards IS strategy will be scrutinised this will lead to a conclusion about the influence of the types of organisations and the national culture in the context of IS strategic plans.

2. Strategy and Information Systems

The question of a strategy definition will not be solved by this examination, but the next part is dedicated to describe strategy in general and provide an understanding of strategic plans. This will be followed by linking that to Information Technology (IT) or rather Information Systems (IS).

2.1 Strategy

Every organisation should be able to answer the question after the purpose of the organisation, the so called mission. It should simply state the reason for being in business. Also a clear understanding ofthe organisational goals (objectives) which concern the desired outcomes should be available (Robbins and Coulter, 2002). Leading from this Robson (1997) argues that the strategy is the direction in which the organisations aims to meet the goals to achieve the mission and defines strategy as:

"..the pattern of resource allocation decisions made throughout an organisation. These encapsulate both desired goals and beliefs about what are acceptable and unacceptable means for achieving them." (Robson, 1997, p.5)

Even when this statement might be controversial to other approaches (e.g. Mintzberg et al., 1998) it describes a general and broad view of Strategy to provide an explanation.
Strategy is not only employed at one single level of the organisation, it is used in several areas and can be divided in three types. First the corporate strategy specifies the strategic framework which the organisation will be in and sets the global mission and goals. The corporate strategy usually follows either a corporate growth, corporate stability or corporate retrenchment strategy (Robson, 1997). 

Derived from this framework the business strategy should be developed for each independent strategic business unit (SBU) focussing on the organisational core competencies which sets them apart, the so called competitive advantage (Robbins and Coulter, 2002). To achieve that, Porter (2004) developed his model of the five competitive forces in order to analyse the market that the business wants to compete in. Competitive advantage should now be derived from the ability of being significantly different from the competitors or being the cost leader. Therefore one should intend for one of his three business level strategies:

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