Assignment
Write a Roadmap with a strategic plan as an appendix.
The word count for this assignment is 2,500 words (excluding references, tables, diagrams, and appendices).
Assignment question
For Assignment you are required to demonstrate an understanding of the application of relevant concepts, tools, techniques, and methodologies, introduced over the course of this module from strategic thinking, to strategic planning, and strategic momentum.
You will select an existing strategic plan of an organisation working in international healthcare. If you are currently working in an international healthcare organisation, you may choose your own organisation. If not, you can select one that you have access to, or you can find an international healthcare organisation strategic plan online. You will play the role of an external Strategy Implementation Consultant hired by the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the organisation. They have hired you at the starting point of the implementation of the strategic plan to write a Strategic Roadmap that will guide the organisation forward in the next 3 years. In the Strategic Roadmap you will advise the CEO of this organisation how to take the strategic plan forward.
When writing the Roadmap keep in mind that the CEO is a busy person, so you need to write professionally, concise, clearly, provide good evidence, and follow Harvard academic referencing systems. It is recommended that you have clear headings that break up your Strategic Roadmap and make it easy for the CEO to follow, and also consider using infographics and other ways to present information in a clear and easy to understand format.
The Roadmap is likely to comprise of the following:
- Executive Summary – where you summarise the key considerations and priorities of the Roadmap.
- Organisational Overview
- Current status – where you will give a brief overview of the organisation’s current status in relation to the strategic priorities. If you know the organisation, you will have insights into how the organisation looks before the strategy is implemented. If you don’t know the organisation, be creative and imagine the type of organisational realities that might have been in place before the strategy. You can also consider reaching out to key informant within the organisation to get deeper insights into the organisational status and issues.
- Strategic vision – here outline the big picture vision for the organisation and where the strategy will take the organisation. What will be the most challenging strategic directions?
- Implementing the Strategy – Here you will explore implementation considerations for each of the strategic directions as outlined in the strategy. These may be explored in the following sub-headings:
- Directional Strategies (vision, mission and values)
- Service/Product Strategies
- Support Strategies
- Measuring the success of the strategy – here you will explore key indicators and success factors and the possible challenges in measuring these, and your recommendations.
- Reflecting and revisiting the strategy – here you will explore issues like when and how to reflect on the strategy, how to continue to align the strategy with the external environment and gain sustainable competitive advantage, and when a new strategy needs to be developed and how.
Cross-cutting themes that you will explore throughout the Roadmap include challenges to implementation, change management, scheduling, market segmentation, communication, learning organisation, stakeholders, marketing, resource implications, value-chain, competitive advantage, skills development and talent management, contingency planning, and leadership. Remember to back-up your advice and recommendation to the CEO with credibly sourced evidence through in-text citations and referencing of module readings as well as wider academic reading.
In the annexes, you must include the strategic plan. You are encouraged to provide additional information such as an action plan for the first 6 months, a contingency plan, or other supporting implementation tools(SWOT, PESTEL analysis) that will be helpful for the CEO.
NOTE:
- You can do this by either choosing an existing strategic plan from the organization that you actually work or you can create your own.
- Some of the things that you want to explore are challenges to implementation, change management scheduling market segmentation and your stakeholders communication resource implications competitive advantages and etc.
- Give organizational overview and how you are going to measure the success and a reflection on the strategy.
Feed Forward
- Find a balance between your discussion points and the academic writing
- Try and relate the case studies to your own professional experience;
- How does your organization position itself in the market?
- What value does it create?
- What’s its reputation?
- What is it’s mission statement and values ?
- Imagine you are part of the Executive team making the strategic decisions
