Strayer JWI540 2021 MAY Discussions Latest (Full)

JWI540 Strategy

Week 2 Discussion

Defining Your Playing Field

The first step of the strategic development process is to determine the “Where to Play” choice that will then help you identify the segment of the market you are targeting and the competitors you will face.

Review the Strategy Project Company Selection Guidelines Click for more options and specify the company (and specific division or product if your company is large and diverse) you will use for Assignments 1, 2, and 3.

How would you define the Playing Field for this business? This should include focused parameters such as the market, segment, product, service, geography, and price where you will choose to compete.

Using the guidance from Martin's article on Porter's Five Forces, as well as Chapters 2 and 3 from Sherman, what predictions do you have about the profitability of this Playing Field? Support your assessment by discussing each of Porter's forces as they relate to your company.

 

JWI540 Strategy

Week 3 Discussion

Generating Growth

Using the company you have selected for your Strategy Development Project, describe one idea to generate substantial top line revenue growth. As you describe and assess this potential move, refer specifically to Figure 4.1 (p. 77) in Chapter 4 of Sherman and to the other readings from this week to support your response.

Do you predict your idea will generate short-term growth, long-term sustainable growth, or both?

How can you keep your competitors from easily copying your strategy?

What costs, systems, or capabilities are necessary for this growth to occur?

 

JWI540 Strategy

Week 4 Discussion

Choose ONE of the following discussion question options to respond to:

Using Adverse Conditions to a Company's Advantage

Chakravorti discusses four methods that corporate innovators use to turn adverse conditions to their advantage. These methods include: (1) Matching Unneeded Resources to Unmet Needs; (2) Rounding Up the Usual Suspects; (3) Finding Small Solutions to Big Problems; and (4) Thinking Platform, Not Just Product.

Examine an organization of your choice and briefly discuss how the organization might use one of these methods to capitalize on the opportunity found in adversity.

-OR-

Assessing Risk and Reward

Locate and post a link to an article from The Wall Street Journal or other reputable source, published within the last year, about an organization whose business strategy was upended by a crisis, but was able to reinvent itself and capitalize on new opportunities in the face of adversity.

Drawing on insights presented in Chapter 5 of Sherman, explain what techniques they leveraged to find a way forward.

 

JWI540 Strategy

Week 5 Discussion

Recognizing the Need for Change

Rita McGrath, Columbia Business School professor and author of the article, "Transient Advantage," discusses several traps that can blind a company to the need for imminent changes to their strategy to preserve competitive advantage. These traps, discussed in the second half of the article, include: the first-mover trap, the superiority trap, the quality trap, the hostage-resources trap, the white space trap, the empire-building trap, and the sporadic-innovation trap.

Locate and post a link to an article in The Wall Street Journal, or another reputable source, about a company that fell victim to one or more of these traps.

Identify the trap(s) and discuss why you believe the company’s management missed the warning signs.

What were the impacts that resulted from falling for the trap(s)?

Drawing on the guidance offered by Sherman in Chapter 6, what could they have done differently to avoid the trap(s)?

 

JWI540 Strategy

Week 6 Discussion

Strategic Growth

As outlined in this week's lecture notes, there are seven common game-winning moves that can be leveraged to differentiate and strengthen competitive positioning. They include: Geographic Expansion, New Price Tiers, Vertical Integration, Moving Into Adjacent Product Segments, New Distribution Channels, Discontinuous Innovation, and Mergers & Acquisitions.

Identify an organization in your industry (but not the company you selected for your course project) that used one of the seven common winning moves.

Which move did they use and why do you think they elected to use this move?

How effective was this move in establishing meaningful differentiation? Support your response with references to this week's materials including Chapter 9 from Sherman.

 

 

JWI540 Strategy

Week 7 Discussion

Game-Winning Moves

Our focus this week is on choosing a strategic direction that will set your organization apart from competitors in a way that enables you to stand out from everyone else. Jack refers to this as “changing the game.” Sherman refers to it as “breaking away from the pack” (Chapter 11).

Using the company you selected for your course project, identify a potential game-changing move that you believe will create a sustainable competitive advantage.

Briefly summarize how the move will fundamentally shift the playing field to the company’s advantage and beat the competition.

Explain which of the three positioning categories described by Sherman (Breakaway, Reverse Positioning, Blue Ocean or Disruptive Innovation) best describes the move, and why.

JWI540 Strategy

Week 8 Discussion

Choose ONE of the following discussion question options to respond to:

Six Deadly Sins of M&A

Review Jack Welch's article "The Six Deadly Sins of Mergers and Acquisitions"

Locate and post a link to an article published in the last 5 years in the The Wall Street Journal, or another reputable source, about a merger that did not go as planned.

Which of these "sins" were committed, what issues arose as a result, and what behaviors could the organization have employed to prevent these errors?

-OR-

Strategic Alliances

Under what circumstances should an organization seek a strategic alliance?

Provide a specific example of a company where a strategic alliance was preferential to an acquisition and summarize some of the unique challenges faced by the alliance leadership team.

What worked well and what did not?

How could the strategic alliance have been managed differently to be more beneficial to the organization(s)?

Support your response with references to this week's readings.

 

 

 

JWI540 Strategy

Week 9 Discussion

Strategy Implementation

You have spent the last several weeks developing your strategy and declaring a game-winning move for the company you selected for the Assignments.

Share the game-winning move you selected for your company.

Identify the most significant challenges you will face in successfully implementing your proposed move. These could be cultural, financial, operational, or any other factors that could undermine your new strategy.

Identify specific steps you will take to successfully overcome these challenges. Include references to this week's materials to support your response.

How will you "sell" the plan to generate buy-in?

 

JWI540 Strategy

Week 10 Discussion

Sharing Your Perspective

This course provided you with the ability to assess the playing field, the competition, and your organization in order to develop a game-winning move. Discuss how this knowledge has changed your perspective on strategy and how your new skills might be helpful for your career trajectory.