The Importance of Strategy Process and Strategy Context in Determining Research Paper

The Importance of Strategy Process and Strategy Context in Determining Strategy Content - Research Paper Example As the paper outlines, strategy context deals with impact of macro environment in strategy formulation. Researchers have pointed out that the strategy process is complemented with three variables such as strategy formation, strategic thinking, and strategic change. They have argued that three variables of strategic process work in an overlapping manner instead of working in an individual manner. Academic scholars such as Bob De Wit and Ron Meyer have stated that strategic content can be viewed as the end product of the strategy process. Strategic content is complemented with four levels of strategy such as Functional Level, Corporate Level, Business Level, and Network Level. Bob De Wit and Ron Meyer have pointed out that strategy context can be classified as the external circumstances directing the implementation and outcome of strategy process. They have differentiated external environment into three segments such as organizational context, industry context and international context . Various research scholars have tried to create a link between triplets of the strategy process, strategy context, and strategy but unfortunately, the majority of them ended with an abstract model without much coherence with industry requirement. In 1986, Miller and Friesen have argued that strategy content is directly proportional to strategy context and strategic initiatives are more successful for electronic goods industry, manufacturing industries and paint industry in comparison to another industry environment (Miller and Friesen, 1986, pp. 37-55). In 1983, Hambrick argued that Porter’s Generic Competitive Strategies have little significance for small level firms while four levels of strategy such as Functional Level, Corporate Level, Business Level, and Network Level have importance for only firms having sufficient resources (Hambrick, 1983, pp. 213- 230). In 1989, Bryman has argued that strategy content works in accordance with organizational resources. For example, P orter’s generic strategy would not be applicable to organizations suffering from resource crisis (read human capital, financial, marketing and IT) (Bryman, 1989, p. 169). Various research scholars have agreed that the validity of three steps such strategy process, strategic content and strategic context is unquestionable. In 2005, Torgovicky’s has tested the validity of strategy content in e-business and concluded that synchronization of strategic content and strategy process can help a firm to achieve a competitive edge over other competitors (Eldring, 2009, p. 10-15).