Assignment:
Current Event Blog 1
In your SLP for this course you will be considered a strategic management subject matter expert and will be asked to blog about important aspects of the strategic management process and to provide examples to support your key arguments based on current events pulled from recent articles from reputable sources (such as a major national news source like the NY Times, Business Week, etc.).
Your main article(s) for each of your blog entries must be no older than 4 months old. If you use an older article as your primary focal article, you will be asked to redo the assignment. You may, of course, use older sources to support your discussion but the current event article serving as the main focus of your paper must be recent.
For your first SLP discuss why the mission and vision are important in helping to shape organizational strategy and find two recent articles (no older than four months old) that provide examples of organizations that seem to be living up to (or failing at) fulfilling their mission and vision.
Remember that you are playing the role of a person blogging about strategic management and the key here is to convey to the public the importance of the mission and vision statement in a strategic management context and to provide examples of organizations who do well (or poorly) in fulfilling their stated missions and visions. Also remember to keep your discussion focused on strategic management.
SLP Assignment Expectations:
Your SLP assignment should be a minimum of 3 pages in length.
You are required to use APA formatting and you are required to cite and reference your sources. There should be a minimum of three
reputable sources cited and referenced in your paper.
Module 2 - Case
ENVIRONMENTAL ASSESSMENT
Case Assignment
In this assignment you will be asked to once again consider Dish in responding to the following two requirements:
Why is it best for large organizations like Dish to use both PEST and Porter's 5 Forces analysis in helping its leaders to understand their particular external environment? Make sure you demonstrate understanding of both analytical processes in your discussion and give clear, Dish-related examples to support your arguments.
Second, describe how the information obtained from the organization's macro-level external analysis might be used by an organization like Dish in performing their SWOT analysis.
In short, what should an organization like Dish be doing to analyze the external environment at the macro-level and how does that overlap with the organization's micro-level analysis efforts? Make sure you provide well-reasoned and well supported arguments.
Assignment Expectations
Your case assignment should be a minimum of 4 pages in length.
You are required to use APA formatting and you are required to cite and reference your sources. There should be a minimum of three reputable sources cited and referenced in your paper.
Please make sure you review the assignment rubric prior to writing your assignment.
Module 2 - SLP
ENVIRONMENTAL ASSESSMENT
Current Event Blog 2
For this SLP submission you will be asked to submit your second blog entry about another important aspect of the strategic management process and to provide examples based on current events pulled from recent articles from reputable sources (such as a major regional or national news source like the NY Times, Business Week, etc.).
Recall that the main article(s) for each of your blog entries must be no older than 4 months old. If you use an older article as your primary focal article, you will be asked to redo the assignment. You may, of course, use older sources to support your discussion but the current event article(s) serving as the main focus of your paper must be recent.
For your second SLP submission, describe why environmental analysis is important and find two recent articles that demonstrate how one or two organizations have reacted to a turbulent or competitive environment in a fashion which indicates they have leveraged their strengths, overcome weaknesses, taken advantage of opportunities, or successfully faced threats to maintain a competitive edge. What is/are the lesson(s) to be learned that you want your blog readers to take away from your analysis?
SLP Assignment Expectations
Your SLP assignment should be a minimum of 3 pages in length.
You are required to use APA formatting and you are required to cite and reference your sources. There should be a minimum of three reputable sources cited and referenced in your paper.
Please make sure you review the assignment rubric prior to writing your assignment.
Module 3 - Case
STRATEGIC PLANNING & STRATEGY FORMULATION
Case Assignment
In this case assignment, consider some key strategies recently implemented by Dish in its effort to succeed and compete in its current competitive environment. Discuss the strategic direction of the company and whether you believe the organization to be on the right track. Make recommendations that you believe would help Dish to gain market share (that is, hypothetically formulate what you think would be useful strategies for Dish to consider). Also comment regarding whether you believe Dish operates in a socially responsible manner and whether their CSR record helps or hinders their success.
Assignment Expectations
Your case assignment should be a minimum of 4 pages in length.
You are required to use APA formatting and you are required to cite and reference your sources. There should be a minimum of three reputable sources cited and referenced in your paper.
Module 3 - SLP
STRATEGIC PLANNING & STRATEGY FORMULATION
Current Event Blog 3
For this SLP submission you will be asked to submit your third blog entry about another important aspect of the strategic management process and to provide examples based on current events pulled from recent articles from reputable sources. (You will need to use at least five peer-reviewed articles for this assignment.) Peer-reviewed articles can be located by using the Trident Online Library. Please make sure that you cite/reference correctly in APA.
For this Signature Assignment, the articles for your blog entry must be no older than 12 months old.
For your third SLP discuss the importance of the strategy formulation and planning phase. Identifyfive recent peer-reviewed articles that discuss a recent major strategic effort on the part of an organization. What would you have recommended if you were sitting at the strategy planning table? Examples of such an effort might include mergers, buy-outs, sell-offs, introduction of innovative products, strategic marketing campaigns, and the like.
Discuss to what extent you believe this effort will succeed given the organization's external environment. What is the takeaway for your reading audience? That is, what strategic planning lessons can be learned from the situation you highlighted in your blog entry?
SLP Assignment Expectations
Your SLP assignment should be a minimum of 3 pages in length.
You are required to use APA formatting and you are required to cite and reference your sources. There should be a minimum of five reputable sources cited and referenced in your paper.
Module 4 - Case
STRATEGY IMPLEMENTATION & EVALUATION
Case Assignment
Please note that this assignment is unique in that your written communication skills will be assessed. This assignment also includes a specialized rubric focused specifically on written communication.
After reviewing the book section, presentation materials, and additional readings you will be asked to compose an argumentative essay where you will argue for or against the thesis identified below regarding the implementation process of a strategic management plan. Here is the thesis statement you are expected to support or refute using well-reasoned arguments:
The successful implementation of the strategic management plan in a large corporation like Dish is highly reliant on measurement and evaluation efforts during and after the implementation phase.
In responding to this assignment you should continue your review of the information available on Dish. Identifying strategies over the past couple of years that did not work out so well versus strategies that succeeded might be helpful in supporting key arguments. Some questions to ask yourself in formulating your arguments might include: What barriers might have gotten in the way of any less successful strategies? And what type of strategic evaluation efforts do you think are necessary to keep an eye on progress in a large company like Dish? How does measurement of implementation processes help assure success? How does the evaluation process help to assure future success?
In this assignment, make sure you clearly identify the position you are taking with respect to the thesis. Your essay should include an introduction, and well developed arguments in support of your position. You should wrap up your essay with a conclusion.
Assignment Expectations
Your case assignment should be a minimum of 5 pages in length.
You are required to use APA formatting and you are required to cite and reference your sources. There should be a minimum of three reputable sources cited and referenced in your paper but more is preferred.
Please make sure you review the assignment rubric prior to writing your assignment. Keep in mind that this rubric is a different rubric from what you are used to as it focuses on the assessment of your writing skills.
Module 4 - SLP
STRATEGY IMPLEMENTATION & EVALUATION
Current Event Blog 4
For this SLP submission you will be asked to submit your fourth blog entry about another important aspect of the strategic management process and to provide examples based on current events pulled from recent articles from reputable sources (such as a major national news source like the NY Times, Business Week, etc.).
Recall that the main article(s) for each of your blog entries must be no older than 4 months old. If you use an older article as your primary focal article, you will be asked to redo the assignment. You may, of course, use older sources to support your discussion but the article serving as the main focus of your paper must be recent.
This final blog entry will be related to your case assignment in that it will deal with Comcast. For this assignment consider the short news article related to Verizon by Albanesius (2014) and the Nakashima (2014) article that discusses a deal made between Disney and the Dish Network. The articles deal with plans to provide video content on mobile devices and on home televisions in an a la carte manner. As you know, Cable companies tend to bundle programming to cause customers to want to buy more premium packages to accommodate their home entertainment desires. The players in the industry have been avoiding the a la carte approach to programming in order to cause customers to pay more through the bundling strategy.
Your assignment will be to present to your blog reading audience an argument as to whether you believe that Comcast is strategically poised to compete with upcoming changes in the environment related to providing an a la carte approach to programming. What should large cable companies like Comcast be doing now so as not to go the way of Kodak?
Make sure you provide at least two very recent articles to support your key points (no older than 4 months old).
SLP Assignment Expectations:
Your SLP assignment should be a minimum of 4-5 pages in length.
You are required to use APA formatting and you are required to cite and reference your sources. There should be a minimum of three reputable sources cited and referenced in your paper.