Strategic Plan

Strategy or the company’s strategic issues should react to environmental changes that have, or will happen. According to Pearce and Robinson, in order for this to take place strategic issues require top-management decisions. This is because strategic decisions over see many areas of a firm’s operations (Pearce & Robinson, 2011, p. 4). A good business strategy can require large sums of money and can often affect the firm’s long term prosperity. A company’s strategic issues will also require considering the company’s external environment. The must consider things that beyond their control such as suppliers and the change in the economy. By having a business strategy a business can create more opportunities that can likely lead to a well prepared firm. However, in order to address strategic issues there must be a form or type of hierarchy in the decision making process. Let’s examine the three levels of strategy next.

With any type of organizational planning there must be some form of chain of command. With business strategy there are three levels, a top, middle, and bottom. The top level of this hierarchy is the corporate level. This level is composed principally of a board of directors, the chief executive, and administrative officers (Pearce & Robinson, 2011, p. 6). This group is responsible for handling the company’s financial performance and achievement of nonfinancial goals. Companies like MCI top level managers are prime examples of how one that is charged with this duty failed at protecting the company’s image in the public eye and did not fulfill their corporate nor their social responsibility. The middle level is the business level. It is composed of business and corporate managers. They help make the vision of the top level into concrete objectives and strategies. The bottom level is the functional level, which is composed of managers of product, geographic and functional areas (Pearce & Robinson, 2011, p. 6).