Military and Corporate Strategy

Strategy is not easily defined and furthermore the term is not exclusively related to just the business world. We can confidently say strategy is key to survival, not only in business but also in the animal kingdom. All animals under go a process of constant change in their physical appearance and in their behaviour. These changes take place over millions of years and the species that survive, do so because throughout their evolution they have perfected certain strategies that have enabled them to develop more successfully in the environment they inhabit. One such case of this successful development is the great hammerhead shark.

Military strategy is a concept that includes a set of ideas placed by military organizations to pursue desired strategic goals. Military strategist is not a modern concept; in fact it has been

According to Slack et al. The corporate strategy or business strategy is the guide lines for the whole corporation’s businesses in relation to its markets, customers, and the competitors (2007). In the same context, the same authors discussed the link between the corporate strategy and

One agrees that both organizational systems are awfully similar to one another. The military strategy is exceptionally strategical and tactical. Furthermore, the strategy highlights clarity to the mission and includes a fast past objective by using the nine key phases. The business approach capitalizes in set objectives. However, a business strategy needs to convince the organization to join the journey; which in turn creates a mission statement by more embellished. Both set of ideas, business and military, when implemented correctly can complement each other in any organizations.

W. Chan Kim (chan.kim@insead.edu) is the Boston Consulting Group Bruce D. Henderson Chair Professor of Strategy and International Management at Insead in Fontainebleau, France. Renée Mauborgne (renee.mauborgne@ insead.edu) is the Insead Distinguished Fellow and a professor of strategy and management at Insead. This article is adapted from their forthcoming book Blue Ocean Strategy: How to Create Uncontested Market Space and Make the Competition Irrelevant (Harvard Business School Press, 2005).

Henry Mintzberg has defined the definition of strategies in academic ways and in practice in 1988. After examing the strategic process, he found that it was more unpredictable than early thoughts. Thus, it couldn’t refer to one process that be called strategic planning. Instead of that, he concludes the following five types :(1)Strategy as plan – a directed course of action to achieve an intended set of goals; similar to the strategic planning concept;(2)Strategy as pattern – a consistent pattern of past behavior, with a strategy realized over time rather than planned or intended. Where the realized pattern was different from the intent, he referred to the strategy

At the outset of the course on the making of strategy we were asked to define strategy. This attempt early on showed the complexities of defining strategy as is evidenced by the opening quote from the book. The process grew rapidly more complex as more readings and perspectives were added. However, approaching the end of the course a handle appeared that would at least allow the student to grasp the basics and speak intelligently in defining strategy.

* The business's strategy refers to the coordinated plan of action that it is going to take, as well as the resources that it will use, to realize its vision and long-term objectives. It is a guideline to managers, stipulating how they ought to allocate and utilize the factors of production to the business's advantage. Initially, it could help the managers decide on what type of business they want to form.

Concept of strategy was first introduced in fifties in organisational literature by faculty of Harvard Business School (Snow & Hambrick, 1980). According to the definition given in Oxford dictionary, “Organizational Strategy are the plans of a large organization about development and dealing with changing markets. These plans must originate from company’s main objective which represents key feature about business of the company. For a strategy to work, it should be divided into smaller achievable targets (Johnson, 2016). One more definition of describes organizational strategy as an expression of how an organization needs to evolve over time to meet its objectives along with a

Business executives in the 1970s and 1980s viewed business strategy as the surest way of increasing productivity and profitability. The assumption is that everything that was significant to decision making and strategic planning could be expressed and subjected to quantitative test, the result would show executive the best strategies. Strategization or strategic planning therefore became a replacement for corporate planning which was long-term focused and useful for developing and guiding diversification strategies that many large companies were pursuing during the 1960s, but failed to deliver expected results. Strategy making focus on positioning the company in the markets relative to competitors in order to maximize the potential for profit.

In today’s fast pacing, competitive and technology oriented era, we often encounter the word ‘Strategy’. However, we need to realize the huge significance strategy encompasses since ‘strategy ‘has a great impact in the overall success and development of an individual and also for an organization. To begin with, Strategy is defined as a high level plan developed to accomplish goals or get a solution to a problem. It is also used to attaining and maintaining a position of advantage over competitors. Strategy is the science of planning and getting the necessary resources to get their most and efficient and effective use.

According to Abraham, (2012) the word strategy mainly originated from the Greek word "Strategoes" that means about the art in general. Moreover, it is the analysis of the project with the help of the direct campaigns. Apart from this, Eiriz, Faria, and Barbosa, (2012) commented that it is one of the styles of the thinking and the process to do the intensive implementation of the system. The strategy of the company is the set of different local acquisitions. However, it also helps to provide different unmatched services to the customers. Gomathi, (2014) also cited that strategy is one of the buzzwords. Moreover, it also basically involves different knowledge from various models and the classes from different issues of the past knowledge and skills in order to formulate the define path as well as the acting with the courage in order to apply strategy. Moreover, it also helped to ensure all the tactics that are mainly aligned with the strategies o0f the business. The strategy is also an art of success in utilizing the mind. In order to discuss all the people can see these tactics, but no one can see that strategy is out of victory that is evolved. Kurza, (2014) discussed some of the four key questions of the strategies include:

The Military Strategy – The strategy of the military of Defence stems from their responsibility within the Grand strategy in developing, sustaining and assigning of military forces and assets to support government policy and achieve the goals of the grand strategic. It operates on two levels namely the Operational Strategy which is the Permanent Joint Headquarters (PJHQ) strategy guiding the use of military forces to achieve the objective of the MOD and Tactical which is the field commanders’ directive for Land, Sea and Air in achieving the Operational goals. The grand strategy was renamed the National Strategy but its definition remains ‘Co-Ordinated

The word “Strategy” has found its birth from the military and has its roots aligned with them. The military’s stance on strategy has always been to defeat the enemy in order to succeed. Which means that military point of view is that to gain a greater share of land by pushing the enemy towards a competitive disadvantage and diminishing its share of land. Red Ocean focuses on competing with the existing rival firms and to increase their market shares by reducing the competing rival firm’s market share.

Why every company needs a sound strategy to compete successfully, manages the conduct of its business, and strengthens its prospect for long-term success? A company’s Strategy consists of the competitive moves and business approaches that managers are employing to compete successfully, improve performance, and grow the business.