General Information
Target Audience
How do you implement a strategy once it has been formulated? The perspective taken in this course is that all managers require the conceptual frameworks and skills to enact change and implement strategy. Any student who will be expected to enact change with or without formal authority (e.g., brand managers; project leaders) are expected to benefit from this class. Students interested in a consulting career (as an external or internal consultant) should also benefit greatly from this course.
This course qualifies for a Strategy emphasis.
Format
In 2025, Professor Doering will offer the course as a full semester course in the Spring with one meeting per week for 12 weeks.
Course Scope
In this course, we will direct attention to the problems associated with pushing strategy forward in organizations. Senior and Middle Managers are increasingly responsible for managing and resolving competing claims for the organization’s limited resources (financial and human). Doing so requires advanced capabilities at managing across functions and business units. Managers thus need sophisticated leadership skills to translate their technical knowledge into effective actions to implement strategy. Equally important are the “systems” that managers must design, maintain, and update in order to facilitate the implementation of the organization’s strategy.
A fundamental objective of this class is to align strategic vision, organizational structure, tasks, people, rewards, and control systems. In this course, we take the view that there is an interactive relationship between strategic intent and strategy implementation.
Students will adopt the perspective of the general manager responsible for the long-term health of the entire organization or a major division. Because they have the capacity to make decisions, they need to have in-depth understandings of the general problems in all the relevant functional areas. Furthermore, they must be able to deal with problems and issues at the level of the total enterprise, as well as its relationships with the external environment.
Evaluation and Grade Breakdown
| Component | Weight |
|---|---|
| Class Participation | 20% |
| Learning Diary | 40% |
| Final Project | 40% |
Required Resources
Course reading packet. Each assigned article or chapter will help you address the issues in the corresponding cases. While we may not discuss each non-case reading, failing to read and think about each reading will limit your ability to address that day’s assignment.