Stragetic Management

USQ MGT8039 Strategic Leadership S2, 2005 Study Book (p 1. 11), sighted that Hoskisson, Hitt and Ireland (2004, p. 37) defined strategic leadership as "the ability to anticipate, envision, maintain flexibility and empower others to create strategic change as necessary... managing through others, managing an entire enterprise rather that a functional subunit". 2. Critical Analysis Strategic management can be described as a process undertaken by top-level management.

Thomson el all (2002, pp.3-15)) elaborate that strategic management is process about defining the purpose of existent of an organization, formulating a long term strategy to fit the organization's external and internal situation, build sustainable advantage and improve organization performance. In contrast, strategic leadership is a function that drives the strategic management process in the organization. In view of this, the author would like to adopt a stand that strategic leadership is different from strategic management but both intertwined and co-exist to compliment each other. Strategic management will not exist without strategic leadership.

The scope of top level management in this respect shall encompasses the Board of Directors, CEO and top management and the strategic leadership which, they exercise would be in-conjunction or individually. Emergence of globalization whilst giving new opportunities for organization to new markets, also exposes organization to new challenges for competitions and rapid changes of competitive environment. The strategic management undertaken by organization to address these challenges required strategic leadership to drive the task of crafting and executing the organization strategy.

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According to Richardson (1994), modern strategic management needs to be met by a multi-skilled strategic leadership response and not adopt a stand of "this by and large, is the only way to do strategic leadership". Nicholls (1994) proposed that in order to counter the fast-changing business environment, organization through the role strategic leadership must adopt the fundamental changes in the way they think and behave with respect to both people and customers.

In the process of strategic management, decisions making would have to take place to determine the direction of the strategy and according to Harrison ; Pelletier (1997) strategic decisions constitute the essence of strategic leadership. Nicholls (1994) also added that strategic leadership of an organization requires equal attention to both paths finding and culture building. He further explained that in "performing this strategic role, strategy formulation and strategy implementation are no longer sequential and separate but are subsumed in the complementary leaderships of path finding and culture building".

Strategic thinking (Bonn, 2001), decision making (Harrison ; Pelletier, 1997) and culture building (Nicholls, 1994) which are associated with human cognitive capability and behavior, required strategic leadership approach in developing and capitalizing these aspects of human resource to support and ensure the success strategic management process. Even though the above observations were made to support the author stance, it would presumptuous to conclude that the practice of strategic leadership would ensure the success of strategic management.

Richardson (1994) in his "strategic configuration" model, explained that the domain of strategic management consist of many components, which includes, decisional processes, environmental circumstances, critical problems, political situation and leadership style. These components according to him, are multi-facet and interactive and the effectiveness of the "strategic configuration" are dependent upon the deployment of all of the components. 3. Conclusion

By definition, strategic leadership is different with strategic management but by being strategic in "nature" and by the definition of this course module, both have common association, which is the top-level management of organization. In view of this, strategic leadership needs to be analyzed and discuss in the context of strategic management.

Reference

Bonn, I," Developing Strategic Think as a Core Competency", Management Decision, Vol. 39/1, 2001, pp 63-70. Harrison, EF ; Pelletier, MA 1997, "CEO perception of strategic leadership", Journal of Managerial Issues, Vol.Ix, no. 3, pp. 299-317 Nicholls, J 1994, "The strategic leadership star: a guiding in delivering value to the custyomer", Management Decision, vol. 21, no. 8, pp. 21-6 (1994)

Richardson, B 1994, "Comprehensive approach to strategic management: leading across the strategic management domain", Management Decision, Vol. 32, No. 8, pp27-41. Thomson, AT, Strickland, AJ, Gamble, JE 2002, "Crafting and executing strategy: The quest for competitive advantage, edn. 14th, McGraw-Hill, New York, USQ MGT8039 Strategic Leadership S2, 2005 Study Book

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