SkyRise Pharmaceuticals Strategic Plan - Case Study Example

Running Head: Strategic Planning Strategic Planning Name Course Lecturer Date Introduction Strategic planning denotes the clarification of the general purpose of an organization, its desired outcomes as well as the way those outcomes will be attained. There are various methods for carrying out strategic planning which depend on factors such as the development phase of a company, changes in a company’s external environment, organizational culture and the reasons of planning. In determining the direction of a firm, it is important to understand its present state and the probable ways to carry out a specific action (Smit, 1999). This paper will give a hypothetical strategic plan for Sky Rise Pharmaceuticals using the goal oriented strategic planning model as well as a retrospective commentary on strategic planning. Sky Rise Pharmaceuticals Strategic Plan Pre-planning stage Mission Sky Rise Pharmaceuticals is a non-profit multinational organization based in Australia which manufactures and supplies a wide range of curative and preventive drugs and surgical equipments to both individuals as well as health centres. It also promotes the health status of the public and assists professionals and patients through the dissemination of authoritative information and standards which is set up by its employees for other medical care technologies, medicines and associated practices which are used to keep up and enhance health as well as to promote delivery of the best health care services. Vision Sky Rise Pharmaceuticals foresees a world where each person has easy access to elevated quality, useful and safe drugs and surgical apparatus. It aims at being a global leader in pharmaceuticals and enhancing the well being of people around the globe. Principles To guarantee strength, capacity and credibility to support and serve the health of citizens, Sky Rise Pharmaceuticals respects the contribution and devotion of its personnel for their efforts in scientific excellence all the company’s business activities. The company also conforms to set principles which will promote open and participatory procedures. Moreover, the firm runs under reasonable business practices with financial prudence and administration discipline. Strategic planning stage Objectives In order to ensure that it sticks to its mission and vision and principles, Sky Rise Pharmaceuticals has set up several business objectives which it intends to achieve. To start with, the company aims at strengthening its focus on its major pharmaceutical activities, working jointly with researchers, industry and policy makers and using high quality management structures to ensure appropriate, accurate and timely delivery of drugs. Moreover, it plans to strengthen and develop its relations with all the stakeholders in the pharmaceutical industry globally in order to create harmonized global health standards (OECD, 1993). Additionally, Sky Rise Pharmaceuticals intends to promote and enhance worldwide public health programmes in consultation and partnership with regional, national and global stakeholders. It also seeks to enlarge its resources for these programmes, majoring on recognized needs and prevalent openings so as to back up its global activities. Furthermore, the company resolves to carry on and boost its devotion to provide high quality dietary supplements and ingredients and to promote the consumption and awareness of those supplements and its related standards. Business Stage Strategies Sky Rise Pharmaceuticals will use the following strategies in its efforts to achieve the above objectives. In the first place, the company will introduce redesigned monographs in a more systematic and phased manner in order to make sure that, adequate time is available in its production activities in order to be in a position to produce high quality drugs and surgical equipments. The firm will also increase chances for stakeholders’ inclusion in the setting of standards by holding many seminars and workshops, presenting frequent updates on the company’s website on the latest innovations as well as enhancing the involvement of its professional board. For elevated impact standards, the firm will make use of a design stage strategy in which the opinions of regulators, industry and customers is sought before the manufacture of a proposed drug or equipment (Hood, 1991). Sky Rise Pharmaceuticals will as well seek ways of getting timely data and basic materials to back up its drug standards. Moreover, the company will enhance the participation of its quality assurance experts in its written standards undertakings to aid ensure compliance with processes. New outlets will also be opened to ensure that clients receive all the drugs that they need on time and easily. In its harmonization efforts, Sky Rise Pharmaceuticals will work with the Australian Pharmaceutical Commission on a potential harmonization pilot whereby monographs will be developed for four common drug elements with the intention of synchronizing the standards for those drugs at the start. The company will also enter into adoption treaties with pharmaceutical manufacturers in other countries like the United Kingdom, United States and India. Evenett & Hoekman (2004) maintains that, such treaties will allow those companies to integrate Sky Rise Pharmaceuticals’ practices into their individual practices which will facilitate future business collaborations. After its Board of Directors approves the objective, Sky Rise Pharmaceuticals will enlarge its presence in India radically by constructing a site which is intended to accommodate over 100 employees. The new location is expected to augment the company’s laboratory capacities. In addition, the firm has launched a free online site consisting of quality principles for drugs that are entering the international market. As a result, the firm will be dedicated basically to non-Australian drug manufacturers who are ready to prove that they are complying with standards that have been instituted by Sky Rise’s board of experts. Additionally, the company will hold workshops on ruining of food as well as dietary components that have gotten substantial interest abroad (Barrow, 1996). Conclusion A strategic plan defines a firm’s main aim, expectations and methods of meeting those expectations. Sky Rise Pharmaceuticals produce and supplies drugs to different parts of the world. The firm’s main objectives are promoting its focus on its central pharmaceuticals operations, harmonization of international health standards, improve global health programs and promote its dedication to the provision of quality food and dietary components. In achieving its goals, the company will redesign monographs, collaborate with Australian pharmaceutical board, broaden its presence in India and conduct workshops. Retrospective commentary Strategic planning is a crucial management tool for any form of organisation both profit and non-profit organisations. As such my retrospective commentary will present the relationship between strategic planning and organizational performance by comparing the performance of firms that use strategic planning in their operations and those that do not use it. For those firms that adopt strategic planning, orderly strategic thinking assists them to find, and choose how to go about the really big issues the business is encountering. It is the dimension and the effects of such strategic issues which results in a focus on the importance of a strategic plan (Ho & Chuang, 2006). According to Fitzgerald (1991), strategic planning forms one of the highly useful value-based administration practices. Few formal administration practices have been confirmed by tough won experience, and established by research, to help organizations to enhance their performance as well as a logical official process to generate a strategic plan. Organizational performance relates to the creation of value for the main beneficiaries of an organization. Thinking and planning strategically can help an organization to keep up the focus of an organization’s team on value creation, and simply not on management practices just for their personal sake. Strategic planning improves the performance of an organization through several ways. In the first place, it enables the setting of long term tactical goals which further the lasting purpose of the firm. This means acknowledging and mentioning the group of individuals for whom the firm exists as well as the specific benefit that the organization seeks to give to that group. Each organization must be formed to benefit a certain clearly described set of beneficiaries. The benefit should also be homogeneous, able to be targeted and quantifiable such as increasing the wealth of the group. This enables the organization to remain focused since they have a duty to accomplish and is accountable to a certain group of people. As a result, the organizational performance is enhanced (Harrold, 1998). Drawing from Industry Commission (1997), strategic planning helps a firm to generate strategic alternatives of executing business operations. It requires the evaluation of major strategic aspects choosing the really central issues and creating alternative approaches for handling the issues. In its strategies, a firm ought not to use all obtainable resources. By reserving some resources, this helps a firm acknowledge uncertainty and augments its flexibility in planning. Alternative strategies may enhance the adaptability of an organization because; by openly assessing options, it is possible for an organization to establish options which are better than its present approach. In addition, san organization will face changes in its business environment; if it has put into consideration alternative emergency plans for those changes, it will be in a position to respond in a more effective manner (Grünig, Kühn, & Clark, 2011). Moreover, a good strategic plan comprises of a SWOT analysis of an organization’s internal as well as external environment. By doing so, an organization is able to identify its core business strengths that give it a competitive advantage over its rivals and thus it is able to capitalize on them. Additionally, the analysis enables it to know its business aspects which fail its operations hence; it is able to improve on those sides. SWOT analysis also helps a firm to spot potential business opportunities in the market which can be exploited to increase the profitability of the firm. Lastly, the analysis helps a firm establish threats like competition in the market and be able to develop strategies to counter those threats. In other words, strategic planning enables a firm to make informed decisions because it is aware of its environment which leads to improved performance (Productivity Commission, 1996). Robinson (2005) alleges that, firms that do not adopt strategic planning are not well focused. This is because; they do not set clearly defined organizational objectives to enable their employees to work towards the realization of a common purpose. In addition, in carrying out their plans, they do not consider several alternatives and their associated benefits. As a result, they mostly make rigid plans which do not work out and which lead to organizational failure. Additionally, the possibility of them making the correct decisions that suit their firms is very minimal. Furthermore, SWOT analysis is part of strategic planning and thus the organizations that do not practice strategic planning do not carry out an evaluation of its business setting. As a result, they are not aware of their strengths, weaknesses, probable business opportunities and threats. Such organizations are likely to suffer from stiff completion form their rivals which may even lead to the collapse of those businesses. More so, expansion for such firms is minimal or not possible because they are unable to spot any openings in the market that they can exploit (Simerson, 2011). From my study on strategic planning, I have also realized that, as much as strategic planning is beneficial and important to organizations, it is associated with some disadvantages. According to Scott (2001), strategic planning mostly gives organizations long-term benefits but there are hardly any available strategic procedures to tackle immediate matters in the organization. In addition, strategic planning process is very costly for some organizations especially the non-profit organizations. Such organizations are not in a position to pay for consultation services for developing a strategy and mainly depend on volunteers. Moreover, when carrying out a strategic plan, an organization is forced to reject several available opportunities. The incapacity to consider all the openings available to a firm is very frustrating. Besides, some organizations set up plans that are exclusively formal. This leads to lack of creativity and innovation in an organization’s strategies (Feldman, 2010). From above, it can be concluded that, high business performance is experienced more by firms that apply strategic planning in their business activities as compared to the firms that do not use it. Strategic planning is associated with certain disadvantages such as lack of solution for short term issues, it is an expensive process and leads to lack of creativity and innovation. References Barrow, C. (1996). 'The strategy of selective excellence: Redesigning higher education for global competition in a postindustrial society. Higher Education , 41, 447-469. Evenett, S., & Hoekman, B. (2004, August 5). International Cooperation and the Reform of Public Procurement Policies. Retrieved May 21, 2012, from http://www.evenett.com/working/EvenettHoekmanProcurementCEPRAugust05.pdf Feldman, K. (2010, January 23). Strategic Planning for Improved Organisational Performance. Retrieved May 21, 2012 Fitzgerald, L. e. (1991). Performance Measurement in Service Businesses. Cambridge: Chartered Institute of Management Accountants. Grünig, R., Kühn, R., & Clark, A. (2011). Process-based strategic planning. Berlin : Heidelberg Springer . Harrold, R. (1998). Resources in Education. Melbourne: Australian Council for Educational Research. Ho, L.-H., & Chuang, C.-C. (2006). A Study of Implementing Six-Sigma Quality Management System in Government Agencies for Raising Service Quality. Journal of American Academy of Business , 10 (1), 167-173. Hood, C. (1991). A Public Management for all Seasons? Public Administration , 69 (1), 3–19. Industry Commission. (1997). Report on Government Service Provision: Steering Committee for the Review of Commonwealth/State Service Provision. Melbourne: Commonwealth of Australia. OECD. (1993). Managing with Market-Type Mechanisms. Paris: OECD. Productivity Commission. (1996). Stocktake of Progress in Belconnen. Microeconomic Reform . Robinson, R. (2005, November 21). The Advantages and Disadvantages of Strategic Management. 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