Strategic Planning Process

For a business to understand their goals and provide them a direction in which the organization wants to go, they must use methods to guide them. Analyzing their objectives, markets they operate in, and their strengths/weaknesses, helps the organization respond to changes that affect their business, allowing them to react or prepare to those changes. Leadership within an organization has a responsibility to lead the company to success by having a clear understanding of the business goals in order to achieve their competitive advantage. Strategic management is a method used by top management to analyze the environment in which an organization operates prior to formulating a strategy, as well as a plan for implementation and control of a strategy (Parnell, 2014).

The strategic planning process can be an effective way for an organization to build their competitive edge within their markets. But some will argue that strategic planning is fruitless because of the length of time it takes to implement the plan, the time it take to get approval on the strategy from leadership, or because of the budget costs associated with the

The economy is constantly evolving and businesses must understand what their strengths or weaknesses are compared to their markets. They must plan for their future and create a strategy on how they will use their business goals, strengths/weaknesses, and environment to gain a competitive edge within their fields. Without a strategic plan, an organization becomes reactive instead of proactive and can cause potential issues in the future of their business. These days, markets are so competitive that unless your strategy enables you to deliver some unique value to customers, you will ultimately fail so you must have a good strategy to continuously improve and reinvent your business to stay competitive (Tobak,