Excerpt
Table of contents
List of figures
Introduction and motivation
1 Methodical approach
2 Fundamentals of strategic planning
2.1 Concept of planning
2.2 Concept of strategy
2.3 Strategic planning and its tasks
2.3.1 Strategic planning
2.3.2 Contents and tasks of strategic planning
2.4 Conceptual considerations: Link between strategic planning and business success
2.4.1 Develop an understanding of strategic planning
2.4.2 Strategic planning and its implementation as an ongoing process
3 Methods and instruments to support strategic planning
3.1 Instruments for the internal strategy statements
3.1.1 The SWOT analysis
3.1.2 GAP analysis
3.1.3 The concept of the experience curve
3.1.4 The concept of the product life cycle
3.2 Instruments for the external strategy statements
3.2.1 The PESTEL analysis
3.2.2 The industry structure analysis
3.2.3 The Product / Market Matrix
3.2.4 The Market Growth/Market Share Portfolio (BCG Matrix)
3.3 Instrument for strategic performance measurement
4 Limits, potentials of strategic planning in today's world
4.1 Problem
4.2 Weaknesses, limits of strategic planning in a volatile environment
4.3 Potentials and challenges of strategic planning
4.4 Project-oriented strategy development
5 Conclusion and outlook
Bibliography
List of figures
Figure 1: Strategic planning process
Figure 2: Internal and external information integrative in the SWOT analysis
Figure 3: SWOT analysis of the Mc Donald's franchise company
Figure 4: GAP analysis
Figure 5: Course of the experience curve
Figure 6: Development of sales volume in the product life cycle
Figure 7: Integrated product life cycle concept
Figure 8: Factors influencing the macro environment with an impact on the company
Figure 9: Five Forces Model according to Porter
Figure 10: Product / market matrix according to Ansoff
Figure 11: Market growth / market share portfolio (BCG portfolio)
Figure 12: Balanced Scorecard
Introduction and motivation
In our dynamic age, companies do not find themselves in a stable or continuous environment, but are confronted overall with increasingly rapid changes, upheavals and discontinuities. Risky environmental developments such as market saturation, corporate concentration and internationalisation tendencies, shorter technology and production cycles as well as the gradual disappearance of competitive barriers are typical of today's competitive situation and constantly endanger market positions. For those companies that anticipate these changes as early as possible, opportunities can arise by using their own strengths through targeted strategies to build new competitive advantages.1
After the Second World War, there were also changes, but these developments were slower and less dangerous due to largely unsaturated markets. Under these conditions, operational management largely oriented towards profit and liquidity was generally sufficient.2
Operational information and data have the characteristic that they can only register the effects of changes, but not the causes. Corporate management that relies exclusively on operational data will take the necessary adjustment steps too late in the event of changes in the environment, thus constantly threatening the existence of the company. There is a danger that the operational data will show the company in a false light, when operationally a satisfactory result is still achieved, but the strategic position of the company has already deteriorated considerably. Another consequence of a lack of strategic thinking is the wrong reaction to corporate crises. Companies that are exclusively operationally oriented tend to expand and perfect their operational instruments in crisis situations and neglect to critically question their strategic position.3
It is often observed that companies concern themselves too much with internal structures and processes and too little with sector/market development and the market/competitive position of the company. Thus, strategies are considered essential for the success of the company in order to be able to operate in the long term.4
Here, a strategy / strategic planning is understood as the fundamental, long-term behaviour of a company and its relevant sub-areas towards the environment in order to realise the long-term corporate goals. The focus is thus on the rational achievement of objectives, which requires the formulation of a large number of coordinated individual measures. A strategy / strategic planning is therefore a bundle of interconnected individual decisions that complement each other and reinforce each other in their effect.5
From a business perspective, strategies include statements about the position of the company in the market (external perspective) as well as statements about the allocation of resources (internal perspective).
Planning is future-oriented in its outlook and action, i.e., goals are set, methods, strategies and activities are formulated to achieve them. Planning can be in a long-term / strategic time frame or in a short-term / operational time frame.
Planning means shaping the future and forms the basis of management, especially in larger companies. This includes an active, systematic examination of the future.6 The organised and integrative totality of the various partial plans (plans), their relationships, structured according to uniform criteria and interlinked, form the so-called planning system.7 Here, the strategy or strategic planning itself is to be examined in such a planning system. The methods and instruments for the creation/support of strategic planning in the context of their usefulness will be the central object of investigation. Furthermore, it will be examined whether these methods/instruments are suitable for this purpose - thus they will be discussed critically.
The countless contributions in the field of strategic planning in the scientific literature tempt the observer to a confusing overview of the interrelationships of the instruments and tasks of strategic planning.
Thus, the topic of strategic planning is an enormously important field of research for science and business for content and thematic reasons. This makes further consideration of strategic planning useful.
In terms of content, strategic planning and its instruments are important for the long-term success of the company, as outlined above.
From a thematic point of view, the orderly and targeted discussion and critical consideration of the selected common instruments / methods to support the tasks of strategic planning is another scientific and meaningful contribution / discourse. Here, the appropriateness / limitation of the instruments for supporting the strategic tasks is discussed by presenting the instruments for the tasks and examining them for strengths and weaknesses.
1 Methodical approach
For this research, it must be said in advance that the economic literature provides a wealth of scientific literature regarding the topic of planning and strategic planning.
This paper does not aim at a complete and extremely systematic literature study - there will be a sufficient systematic literature selection according to certain criteria and in certain media, which will be briefly described below.
First, the relevant search portals on the internet had to be selected for this work:
- ILU Library
- Google Scholar
- Scirius.com / scientific database
- Base-search.net / Database of the University of Bielefeld
- Metager.de / Uni Hannover
- Ocl.org/oaister / University of Michigan
- Scientificcommons.org / free publications
- Forschungsportal.org / Federal Ministry of Education and Research
- Infomine.ucr.edu / various universities in the USA
- Ilek.de / scientific texts in various search engines
- Bibliothek.uni-regensburg.de/dbinfo / Uni Regensburg
- Google
- Springer Publishing House
- Gabler Publishing House
- Schäffer Poeschel Publishing House
- Amazon
- Auditing firms
These portals were searched for scientific, freely published articles as well as book literature, relevant journal literature and published articles in university libraries.
The following keywords were used for the search:
- Strategic corporate management
- Strategic controlling
- Strategic Management
- Strategic values
- Strategic planning
- Strategic Planning
- Strategy
- Corporate strategy
- Strategic organisation
- Strategic corporate planning
- Instruments of strategic planning
- Methods of strategic planning
- Strategic controlling instruments
- Strategy process
- Tasks and goals of strategic planning in the company
- Success factors of strategic planning
- Controlling
- Planning
- Corporate planning
- Corporate Planning
- Planning systems
- Operational planning
- Planning processes
- Planning areas
- Planning subsystems
These selected key words for indexing the literature presented are a central selection that can provide the work with the necessary basis for analysis.
Here, considerably more keywords could be created, so that a considerably higher number of literature would be available.
After the review and initial analysis of the existing literature, the instruments / methods for task support that are central and essential for the work have been sifted through and deemed sufficient, so that an expansion of the literature research with new search terms does not appear necessary or purposeful.
The methods / tools to be analysed for strategic planning are as follows:
- BSC - Balanced Scorecard / Kaplan, R.S./Norton, D.P.
- SWOT analysis / internal and external strengths/weaknesses analysis
- Industry Structure Model / Five Forces Model / Porter, M.
- Product/market strategy portfolio / Ansoff, I.
- PESTEL analysis (macro-environmental analysis, complex and global environment)
- GAP analysis / analysis of operational and strategic gaps
- Product life cycle model
- Experience curve model / Henderson, B.D.
- Portfolio concepts/models (BCG matrix)
The work will begin with the theoretical foundations for the strategic planning topic. An attempt will be made to define the terms of planning and strategy, because even the scientific discourse does not have a uniform representation/approach of the terms, so that an adequate terminology will be developed in this work.
Subsequently, the ideas of planning and strategy are merged into Strategic Planning for Business and a definition applicable to this work is also developed.
Finally, it will be shown what a possible result of strategic planning can be - i.e. what strategic information and components the strategic plan has, which must then be operationally implemented in the company. In the next chapter, the tools/methods used to develop these components can be seen.
In the third chapter, the tasks of strategic planning are discussed and presented, and then in the fourth chapter the instruments that support this task are analysed.
In the fourth chapter, the central and essential instruments and methods that could be developed from the literature analysis are first presented so that a basic understanding of the strategic methods can emerge. The main instruments are briefly presented and related to the tasks described above.
The central focus of this paper will be to discuss the methods controversially - i.e. to point out their strengths and weaknesses identified in the scientific discourse in order to work out starting points for a further in-depth discussion of the methods for processing strategic planning.
In the last chapter, a conclusion will be drawn. The criticism in the discussion of methods is to be briefly taken up and weighed up with regard to the task as expedient and meaningful as well as practice-friendly. Furthermore, the gaps in the literature research (limitation) will be briefly pointed out at this point. Likewise, in an outlook for this topic, possible starting points for further investigations in this subject area are to be pointed out - also possible further missing methods for certain tasks / information are to be briefly included here.
In the last chapter, a conclusion will be drawn about the instruments of strategic planning - i.e. the critical discussions will be considered and the following summarised:
- What do the instruments have in common?
- Do the instruments have a model character?
- Can the instruments be divided into internal and external strategic planning support?
- What problems and limitations do the instruments reveal?
- Are the instruments implementable?
- Summary assessment of the usability and informative value of the instruments.
2 Fundamentals of strategic planning
In this chapter, the concepts of planning and strategy will be discussed in isolation and in the context of the enterprise. Subsequently, the results of planning and strategy will be brought together to form strategic planning in the enterprise. This leads to the components of strategic planning, which represent the result of such planning. The components are briefly described in the context of the instruments. Finally, the tasks of strategic planning are presented, which are to be supported by the instruments / methods - these are discussed in chapter four.
2.1 Concept of planning
The relevant scientific literature has countless representations of the term planning. Some of them are presented in this chapter in order to create an approach that is valid for this thesis.
Planning is the current mental anticipation of future economic action, taking into account the rational principle.8 Its basic problem is uncertainty as a lack of predictability or low predictability of events.9
Planning is based on forecasting. It comprises statements about probable future developments, events, facts, conditions and behaviour that are as objective, systematic and logically justified as possible.10
Planning in a company can be according to the respective planning levels:
- Strategic planning
- Tactical planning
- Operational planning11
Here, the planning level is presented in a planning hierarchy - the top level and the most authoritative for the other levels is Strategic Planning, which provides the framework for the other planning. The second level is Tactical Planning, which is seen as a link to Strategic Planning, as it is here that the enterprise is planned and equipped with the important capital resources to bring the operational and next level into an implementation reality.12
This classification has become established in economic literature. However, the assignment to the corporate levels is not uniform in the literature. Above all, there are different views on the designation within the framework of the levels and the allocation of the tactical or operational planning concept.13
A further presentation of the concept of planning and the tasks of planning is contained in the standard work on business administration by Wöhe / Döring / Brösel.
In order for management to realise its objective of maximising profits in the long term with the help of the operational process, it needs to plan how the operational process is to be carried out. The management is faced with the serious problem that the realisation of its general and specific objectives can usually be attempted in different ways. It has to make decisions, fix its plan and thus set very concrete goals for all departments of the enterprise for a certain planning period, which are to be realised. The activities of the so-called dispositive factor thus take place in the following stages, as already mentioned above: Set goals - plan - decide - implement - control.14
Planning is the mental anticipation of future action by weighing up various alternative courses of action and deciding on the most favourable path. Planning therefore means making decisions that are directed towards the future and through which the operational process flow is determined as a whole and in all its parts. Since decisions can be made not only on the basis of systematic mental preparation, but also from a momentary situation, intuitively so to speak - a large part of the decisions made in business practice are of this kind - the terms planning and decision cannot be equated. Accordingly, planning is such decision-making that is not based on improvisation.15
Just like planning, forecasting is also directed into the future. However, while planning determines which decisions must be made for future events to occur, forecasting predicts that certain events are likely to occur. Thus, although forecasting is an important and indispensable part of the decision-making process, it is not characterised by active action, unlike planning. It is a method of planning.16
Thought leaders in economic literature relate planning to the concept of rationality. Rationality is seen as a central component and feature in planning, because here rationality is conceptually linked to justifications. Thus rationality and justification belong very closely together. Here, in a general sense, the rational is justified in such a way that there are reasons for it - or justifications serve as a basis for this rationality.17 Rationality is also presented as an interplay of subjects - these subjects dispose themselves capable of speech and action in certain behaviours (i.e. actions and/or decisions) and these are based on justified decisions.18
According to this, actions in a planning phase are related to justifications - thus actions are only rational if they are justified. But the justifications must also be subject to certain criteria of rationality.19
The claim of rationality can only be presented and substantiated if they are well justified.20 Actions that are rationally justified must also be reflected upon in order to eliminate any unevenness - here, reasons are to be weighed against each other in order to make a final and rational decision.21
Rationality also concerns the capacity of learning in the subjects / persons who commit the rational acts and actions and behave rationally in order to generate justified decisions.22 actors should be self-critical of their actions - learn from criticism and thereby develop rationally critical solutions to problems.23
In this context, rationality should also be seen in a bounded framework, which can likewise strongly influence planning: for example, the limits and resource constraints of information, time, knowledge and skills, finances, etc. These can limit the rationality of actors in their actions and judgements.24
In summary, rationality encompasses a kind of multidimensionality - i.e. , on the one hand, empirical-cognitive, technical-instrumental justifications / dimensions form the basis of decisions and, on the other hand, also evaluative-ethical justifications / dimensions, which in the result produce a rational acceptance and a so-called preferability of norms, goals and purposes in decision-making.25
Here, planning is first of all the expression of a person to think about something, to consider and to carry this out purposefully, and thus to do something deliberately.26 Planning here is an idea of what is going to happen and is to be done accordingly - i.e. a mental visualisation that is anticipated. Also included here is a reflection on what is to be and how it is to be achieved. Thus, planning is an almost exclusive mental thought process consisting of reflection, design and comparison - the result should be a so-called mental blueprint - called a plan.27
Planning considerations are given when actors/responsible persons do not know how to achieve a goal - that is, which measures are to be taken to achieve this goal. Thus, planning also has the character of problem solving - through deliberation and reflection. Thus, planning is done when actions are needed to take developments and measures to solve problems in the future.28 In this context, a forward-looking view into future developments is assumed in planning. Options for action that are to realise the planned goals are projected into the future and thought through in terms of success. The planning thoughts should be reflexive - evaluated - goals and means should not only include the so-called ex-post learning from mistakes, but also ex-ante learning - learning through an evulative and anticipatory reflection that flows into the decisions.29
Planning is essentially related to the future, i.e. a management of future problems, including the present situation. But the problems to be remedied are not yet present, but it is currently apparent that they will spread in the future and can be prevented in the future through present considerations.30
In these theories, planning is not only thinking and acting in the future and reflecting on the possible problems, but also actively acting, shaping or also actively changing - these actions directed towards the future. Planning is here associated with the considered creation in the future.31
The future is to be actively influenced here by making decisions that positively shape problems in the future.
Simon as a champion of rationality and irrationality in planning. Significant are his pioneering studies on the causes of unpredictable human behaviour. His theories conditioned the entire subsequent development of studies on human rationality in management.32
In the light of Simon's critique, psychologists have looked more at people who make wrong interpretations of opportunities. The main study in this direction was a 1979 theory that explained how bounded rationality basically works in humans. These heuristics are simple and automatic "rules" - that make people make a quick decision in an uncertain situation, e.g. according to certain availability heuristics, a person tends to overestimate the availability heuristic.33
In particular, Simon has developed a theory of rationality that suggests that the impossibility of complete human rationality in organisations comes from the unconscious. Thus, in 1980, Simon defined and explored three substantive areas of rationality: evolutionary theory - sociobiology (theory of human rational choice with reference to new behaviours) - the discipline of cognitive science with reference to the study of the mechanisms of the mind. Thus Simon moves in the same context as the previously presented literature, but says that on the one hand humans inherit a certain rationality (evolutionary theory), so that they cannot decide and judge differently in certain situations because they are genetically manipulated to certain contents and ways of proceeding. Furthermore, people / managers can only judge certain decisions influenced by a certain social behaviour that is inherited and are not free from previous social behaviour and interaction patterns that they have experienced (sociobiology). Ultimately, cognitive common sense decides on a final situation assessment and assumes a certain cognitive rationality in decision-making.34 Thus, planning is also assumed to have a certain rationality here, but this is influenced by the individual (his or her background, previous professional and social behaviour and cognitive ability) and is therefore presented differently.
In these described scientific contributions, planning means shaping the future and forms the basis of management, especially in larger companies.35
Planning can therefore be defined, in summary, as a system-oriented, future-oriented and rational, mental determination of goals, measures, means and alignments for the future-oriented achievement of goals.36
This understanding must be expanded to include decision-oriented and subjective components, so that planning can be characterised by some essential features:37
- Planning is goal-oriented: it serves to determine future target states in order to enable control and thus overall management.
- Planning is design-oriented: it serves to shape future target states and thus to prepare decisions.
- Planning is future-oriented: it forecasts future developments and is based on (mostly) imperfect information, whereby the uncertainties of the future increase with increasing planning range (planning period).
- Planning is usually a rational process: that is, it is carried out in a systematic manner. However, it does not follow a schematic process, as planning is differentiated depending on the situation.
- Planning is an information-processing process: that is, it involves the collection, storage, selection, processing and transmission of diverse information.
- Planning is a subjective process: this means that the subjectivity of the planner influences both the selection of the planning object, the objective, the planning method and the assessment of the results (see Simon's rationality accounts presented earlier, which state, for example, that rationality is subject to and influenced by a person's idiosyncrasy and social upbringing).
With these descriptions of the understanding of planning, the theory of planning and its rationality is summarised in brief and forms the foundation for the following explanations in this thesis.
As a basis for proper corporate planning, an analysis of the internal and external corporate field should be carried out in order to grasp the complexity and dynamics of the environment on the basis of strategic influencing factors. Building on the analysis, strategic planning is made possible. The development of strategic goals forms the starting point for all further planning activities. The target system is thus the starting position for planning, in which measures and resources for achieving the target are determined. Which strategic goal is chosen depends on the corporate mission statement and the vision by which a company defines its self-image.38 39 The strategic goals are to be derived from the mission statement. These must be future-oriented, consistent, transparent, influenceable, measurable, interaction-oriented and realisable.40 Suitable strategies are to be developed for the realisation of the strategic goals, whereby a distinction is to be made between corporate, business field and functional area strategies.41 The definition of goals and strategies is followed by strategic planning, which derives specific measures to ensure the long-term success of the company. Depending on the time horizon, tactical planning with a medium-term planning horizon and operational planning with a short-term planning horizon can be derived or differentiated between on the basis of general individual corporate planning in addition to strategic planning.42 Different planning instruments are used here, which are explained in detail and critically discussed in the fourth chapter.
2.2 Concept of strategy
The uniform definition of a strategy term is not possible from the existing scientific literature in this thesis and in general. On the one hand, there are countless presentations in the literature on the topic of strategy and on the other hand, this enormous number of contributions cannot be analysed meaningfully in this thesis. In this work, the concept of strategy is to be seen in connection with strategic decisions, strategic management and strategic action, so that an approach to the concept of strategy that applies to this work can be formed from this.
Hungenberg speaks of an inflationary use of the term strategy.43 The term strategy is used in many dimensions of the economic context - e.g. competitive strategies, corporate strategies, attack and defence strategies for companies in an aggressively courted market environment. It also includes the concepts of growth strategies and human resources strategies in the context of the shortage of skilled workers and their long-term commitment to the company. This strategy term is also used outside the economic context, e.g. in sport as a game strategy or in everyday working life as a professional strategy and tactic. Hungenberg44 states that etymologically the term comes from the Greek and can be traced back to the word strategos. Here the meaning is to be seen in the military and means the art of army command - a war strategy that is to lead to victory. The economic sciences initially used this concept of strategy in economic game theory, in which planning for certain sequences of action should be worked out, depending on possible own sequences of action and possible foreign (the opponent's) sequences of action, which should lead to victory. Here, too, the well thought-out sequence of actions should lead to a victory or success - thus an effective strategy is to be seen in connection with potentials for success. In the case of the concept of strategy, it was the task of business administration to incorporate this concept into its economic considerations, because this scientific field of economics is and was also about evaluating the past and projecting it into the present in order to gain insights (strategies, actions) for the future of the company.45
Baum describes the concept of strategy as the establishment of generally valid basic rules that could be applied to various military situations.46 He also points out that this term was used in economic game theory - in which a strategy is described as the planning of a certain sequence of actions, whereby each action is thought through in dependence on other possibilities.47
Gälweiler coined the concept of strategy in economic literature in the way he said that strategic management is to be understood as the search for, development and maintenance of sufficiently high and secure success potentials, taking into account the associated long-term liquidity effects.48 In distinguishing between strategy and operation, Gälweiler does not focus on conventional short-, medium- and long-term corporate planning, but places the development and maintenance of success potentials at the centre of strategic management. Operational management is geared towards immediate achievement of success - the best possible use of the given potential for success - (i.e. tool of strategy for strategic goal achievement).49
Mintzberg expanded rational strategy planning with so-called emergent strategies - that is, he is of the opinion that this strategy is not written down in the company, but develops and evolves from the company in an evolutionary way. For him, the concept of strategy and strategy was the following: 5 P-strategy: Plan (goals of a company) - Position (market and competitor positioning of the company) - Pattern (past individual decisions as a basis for future behaviour patterns) - Ploy (Cunning: spontaneous, tactical measures to be used situationally in order to secure and expand market advantages) - Perspective (mindset of a company that describes the strategic behaviour of employees and management).50
In the 19th century, von Clausewitz described the term from the perspective of the military, using it as a political characteristic for waging war. Thus, the concept of strategy was seen as a component of political leadership - because a deployed army with soldiers had a certain capacity / resource - under this premise it should fight and if possible win. This was then equated with a company, because they too operate under resource scarcity and still have to fight for a competitive advantage in the market in order to survive in the long run. The entrepreneurial was equated with the military - because here, too, offensive and defensive action had to be used when necessary, depending on the competitive situation. Thus, as a result, in his theory, a commitment of resources in the company and a central orientation towards a long-term competitive advantage emerged as a central feature of the concept of strategy.51
Neumann and Morgenstern took the concept of strategy from the mathematical game theory of 1947 - there, too, the concept was related to the military and the economic idea. This game theory was about conflict situations and their treatment / encounter - thus actions / strategies had to be solved mathematically for this by also including actions of other market participants that could influence one's own decision-making actions. Thus, a central feature of strategy was built up here by taking into account the decisions / actions of others on the market and countering them accordingly, e.g. with certain strategic actions of one's own (as in a military action in war).52
Hinterhuber borrowed heavily from Moltke's definition - for him, the concept of strategy is a guiding idea for the permanently changing market conditions. This guiding idea should manifest itself for a strong and long-term market position of the company - transparent, realisable and long-term competitive advantages should be fundamental as a target. Thus, for him, a strategy is achievable when a certain objective has been achieved through coherent decisions.53
In the following - also taking into account the previously described definitions of the term strategy - a strategy is understood as the fundamental, long-term behaviour of a company and its relevant sub-areas towards the environment for the realisation of the long-term corporate goals. The focus is thus on the rational achievement of goals, which requires the formulation of a multitude of coordinated individual measures. A strategy is therefore a bundle of interconnected individual decisions that complement each other and reinforce each other in their effect.54 From a business perspective, strategies include statements on the position of the company in the market (external perspective) as well as statements on the allocation of resources (internal perspective).55
2.3 Strategic planning and its tasks
2.3.1 Strategic planning
In strategic planning, the principles / characteristics from planning theory (goal orientation, design orientation, future orientation, rational process, information-processing process and subjective process) are combined with strategy theory (pursuing long-term behaviour of the company, analysing the environment, internal company analyses, reason-driven goal achievement) in order to design strategic planning for the company.
Abstract-strategic planning is an essential prerequisite for management. The existence of a coherent and consistent strategic plan is considered a prerequisite for strategy implementation. The task of strategic planning requires a deep understanding of a company: competitive environment, company context and business operations.56
Management practice and literature recognises and is relevant to strategy as its core issues. Strategy involves many facets, aspects and issues. Despite great importance in the management literature, there are surprisingly different views on what a strategy entails. Undeniably, strategic planning is one of several steps that characterise the so-called strategy process to arrive at a coherent and consistent solution. To support strategic planning, efforts are available in practice, such as visual representations, these are essential tools in the implementation in strategic planning (e.g. the "Balanced Score") map or the "BCG Matrix". Previous work has been subjected to a critical reconstruction of such strategy analysis tools. The users of enterprise models concluded that enterprise modelling methods, such as "multi-perspective enterprise modelling", provide a detailed organisational context, are relevant and necessary for strategic planning.57
In the following, some requirements / further characteristics (also called reference points for strategic planning) for strategic planning are mentioned in order to improve and support strategic planning - subsequently, the most common strategy process in the literature is presented in order to derive, among other things, the tasks (contents) of the process / planning from this, in order to then in turn assign the associated instruments (methods) that are necessary to achieve these contents (these are explained in detail and critically discussed in chapter 4).
First requirement for strategic planning: The method should support: different procedural schemes for strategic planning. For example, it should also allow for an iterative process - as a linear sequence of tasks and not include specific rules for the potential users. The key idea of strategic planning as a management task is to create an information base - prerequisites for later implementation in an intended strategy.58
Second requirement for strategic planning: The method should support: the design of a coherent and consistent strategic plan. It should provide conceptualisation and representation - for a precise and elaborate representation of the concepts and their perceived influence and impact in a strategic plan should be described and thereby support the integration of the concepts (e.g. planned activities and resources) and their coordination. Therefore, a meaningful coordination of activities is necessary - this promotes future success potentials. Strategic planning is considered as organisational planning. As a tool - a documentation of commitments to coordinate actions.59
[...]
1 Cf. Bamberger/Wrona 2012, p. 12f., Cf. Bergmann/Bungert 2013, p. 15f.
2 Cf. Eschenbach/Siller 2011, p. 203f.
3 Cf. ibid.
4 Cf. Hungenberg 2014, p. 50f., Cf. Bea/Haas 2017, p. 11f.
5 Cf. Macharzina/Wolf 2015, p. 259.
6 Cf. Horvath 2015, p. 146.
7 Cf. Welge/Al-laham/Eulerich 2017, p. 4., Cf. Bleicher 1999, pp. 223-251.
8 Cf. Wöhe/Döring 2005, p. 114.
9 Cf. Ehrmann 2007, p. p. 25f.
10 Cf. Hahn 2001, p. 85.
11 Cf. Ehrmann 2007, p. 125.
12 Cf. Olfert/Pischulti 2007, p. 215.
13 Cf. Dillerup/Stoi 2007, p. 85., Cf. Meier 2015, p. 110f.
14 Cf. Wöhe/Döring/Brösel 2016, p. 72f., Cf. Kieser 2004, p. 47f.
15 Cf. Wöhe/Döring/Brösel 2016, p. 72f.
16 Cf. ibid.
17 Cf. Habermas 1981a, p. 27.
18 Cf. Habermas 1981a, p. 44.
19 Ibidem, p. 45.
20 Cf. Rescher 1988, p. 5.
21 Cf. Habermas 1981a, p. 38f.
22 Cf. Habermas 1981a, p. 39f.
23 Cf. Habermas, 1981a, pp. 39 and 44f.
24 Cf. Habermas 1981a, p. 45f.
25 Cf. Habermas 1981a, p. 25ff., p. 44f.
26 Cf. Wild 1982, p. 12f.
27 Cf. Wild 1982, p. 14f.
28 Cf. ibid.
29 Cf. ibid.
30 Cf. Wild 1982, p. 13f.
31 Cf. Wild 1982, p. 15f.
32 Cf. Cristofaro 2017, p. 5.
33 Cf. Cristofaro 2017, p. 10.
34 Cf. ibid., p. 11f.
35 Cf. Horvath 2011, p. 146, Cf. Weber et al. 2017
36 Cf. Wild 1982, p. 13f., Cf. Ehrmann 2007, p. 110f.
37 Cf. Klein/Scholl 2011, p. 3.
38 Cf. Welge/Al-Laham 2008, p. 199.
39 Cf. Eckhardt 2018, p. 28f., Cf. Baum et al. 2013, p. 10f.
40 Cf. ibid., Cf. Hungenberg 2014, p. 26f.
41 Cf. Hungenberg 2014, p. 74f., Cf. Bamberger/Wrona 2012, p. 41f.
42 Cf. Horvath 2011, p. 171, Cf. Kreikebaum/Gilbert 2018, p. 112f.
43 Cf. Hungenberg 2014, p. 5.
44 Cf. ibid.
45 Cf. ibid.
46 Cf. Baum et al. 2013, p. 1.
47 Cf. ibid, p. 2.
48 Cf. Gälweiler 2005, p. 28.
49 Cf. ibid., p. 29.
50 Cf. Mintzberg 1995, p. 195ff.
51 Cf. Staehle 1999, p. 601f.
52 Cf. ibid., p. 602f.
53 Cf. Hinterhuber 1990, p. 50f.
54 Cf. Macharzina/Wolf 2015, p. 259., Cf. Steinle 2005, p. 75f.
55 Cf. Reisinger/Gattringer 2017, p. 19ff.
56 Cf. Bergmann/Strecker 2018, p. 1f.
57 Cf. ibid., p. 2f.
58 Cf. ibid., p. 4ff.
59 Cf. ibid., p. 4ff.