Summary
The business sector continues to undergo tremendous developments in the 21st century. With numerous technological advancements, wider market bases, higher consumer purchasing powers, and market liberalizations in many parts of the world, entrepreneurs and businesspersons continue to enjoy high profits margins from their investments.
Despite these advancements, the resulting business environment becomes competitive with increased risks, inadequate forecasting abilities, emerging structural systems, and fluid firms as well as industrial boundaries. All these factors compel management teams in business firms and franchises to engage in innovative ideas that can withstand the new business landscape intertwined in dynamism, complexity, chaos, and contradictions.
Formulation of plans plays an imperative role in effective management of business opportunities. It is from these strategic management plans that leadership structures in any business entity develop the ways of maximizing the opportunities, while reducing the risks associated with the threats and weaknesses evident in the venture.
Plans and objectives offer the engaged workforce clear goals and expectations within given periods, thus creating a hard-working labor force. This increases the chances of high productivity, hence earning more profits to the business. Strategic planning, proper management, adequate entrepreneurial skills, and efficient workforce provide the grounds for successful business set-up with the ability to enjoy competitive advantage over the rivals in the market.
Key Learning Points
Strategic management is a process that guides the day-to-day activities in a business entity; it helps in continuous renewal and growth of business by providing contexts essential for development and implementation of business operations. Business entities formulate such plans by developing missions, achievable objectives, strategies, as well as setting policy guidelines (Schendel & Hofer, 1978).
Qualcomm Corporate entrepreneurship program remains a successful story for the company given its acquisition of talented and innovative labor force. The company created an avenue for all employees to engage consumers in market analysis before the introduction of a telecommunication gadget in the market. This strategy has benefited the company through increased sales. Qualcomm commands a competitive advantage over rivals, which develop telecommunication gadgets and impose them on consumers (Dess, 2012).
Entrepreneurship entails the process of creating wealth through a sequence of commitment by persons who take significant risks in business, and work towards providing products and services to accessible markets. Value additions and innovations play a vital task in the success of many entrepreneurs.
For this reason, most entrepreneurs invest more in innovative ideas of the already existing products and services to win the hearts of the vibrant customers; it is the entrepreneurs’ innovative ideas that continue to revolutionize the business behavior in the current dynamic markets. As Ireland et al. (2003) put it, entrepreneurial and strategic actions in the current business environments majorly target ways of finding new markets and creating competitive space for wealth creation and business success.
Relevant Statements to the Session
Even though strategy and entrepreneurship in business are independent constructs, strategic entrepreneurship remains intertwined between these two concepts with an aim of ensuring business success (Schendel & Hitt, 2007). The creativity, imagination, and opportunities that come handy with strategic entrepreneurship are fundamental to all markets. The UAE market, for instance, continues to attract global attention due to liberalization and international trades; these are significant results from strategic entrepreneurship.
Entrepreneurship plays an integral role in creating employment, as well as growing the economy of a country. Markedly, in case entrepreneurs gain ground in UAE, several individuals will gain access to the job structures that the system will create. On the same note, one aim of strategic entrepreneurship revolves around creating geographic entities in business.
For this reason, motivation and support of entrepreneurial activities in the UAE provides a sufficient strategy for advancing the level of economic growth and development not only to the Middles East trading block but also to the wider Arab common market (Schendel & Hitt, 2007).
Critical Analysis and Implementation
Companies implementing strategic entrepreneurship within their ranks enjoy great profits since innovative skills trickle continuously into their systems, thus ensuring maintenance of competitive advantage in markets.
Therefore, the need to adopt strategic management and entrepreneurship skills in the production sector of business entities is indispensable. Initiation and implantation of these facets of management involve a series of consultation and consensus among all stakeholders involved in business managements. Different ways of implementing such a program in an organization are discussed below.
Emphasizing Ethical Behavior and Value Based Decisions
In order to develop a strong workforce base grounded on integrity and hard work, the process of recruiting new employees must emphasize the need for value-based individuals in the production sector. This ensures that the new staffs join the production force with a vast array of creative ideas in production, thus increasing the chances of maintaining competitive advantage in the market (Rommel, 1995).
Develop Clear Goals
Formulating goals and objectives remain vital in ensuring success of any organization. It is imperative for management teams in any business entity to develop clear goals, and defines strategies for achieving such goals. This ensures that all employees in the organization engage in effective production towards a common goal. Similarly, management teams must develop strong expectations from the defined goals to ensure that each individual performs his/her function with maximum benefits.
Practical Implications
Smallbone (2010) argues that for an upcoming business organization, proper mechanisms are necessary to exploit the global market using available technologies. Proprietors of the new business entity must develop sustainable ways of improving on the available products and services to win the already competitive customer base. Most businesses fail because many aspiring businesspersons venture into the field using “trial and error” methods.
However, effective strategic planning, management, and entrepreneurship provide liberal market feasibility program by pinpointing specific zones of inevitable success, as well as establishing viable ways of maintaining a competitive advantage in an industry. A well-stated and clearly defined strategic entrepreneurship structures enable employees to direct innovation behaviors towards a common goal, thus reducing instances of business failure.
Learning Reflections
Adoption of a dynamic competitive mind is necessary for profitability in the market. In order to institute this, management teams in an organization must recruit a flexible and speedy workforce full of innovative minds.
In the interviews and recruitment sessions, it is necessary to hire an individual with adequate strategic leadership qualities to ensure dynamism in production (Rommel, 1995). On the same note, proper mechanism of exploiting individual brilliance and efforts are necessary. Incentives and rewards for exemplary performances among the employees play an important role in employee motivation.
Supporting Evidence
The current world market is flooded with several businesspersons. At the same time, consumer satisfaction plays a key role in the success of businesses. Innovative ideas and value addition mechanisms remain paramount in the struggle towards consolidating market bases.
From these aspects, strategic entrepreneurship remains an important initiative that business entities strive to develop their styles of operation to cope up with the market competitions. Educational segment of business and international trade plays an integral role in imparting the necessary skills and knowledge needed for business survival in the dynamic market.
References
Dess, G. G. (2012). Strategic management: text and cases.New York: McGraw-Hill/Irwin.
Ireland, R.D., Hitt, M.A., & Sirmon, D.G. (2003). A model of strategic entrepreneurship: The construct and its dimensions. Journal of Management, 29(6), 963–989.
Rommel, G. (1995). Simplicity wins: how Germany’s mid-sized industrial companies succeed. Boston, Mass.: Harvard Business School Press.
Schendel, D. & Hitt, M. (2007). Strategy versus entrepreneurship. Strategic Entrepreneurship Journal, 1(1), 25-36.
Schendel, D. & Hofer, C. (1978). Strategic management: A new view of business policy and planning. Boston: Little Brown and Company.
Smallbone, D. (2010). Entrepreneurship and public policy. Cheltenham, UK: Elgar Research Collection.