Strategic Leadership
Strategic leaders manage the strategic management process that is designed to help the organisation achieve its objectives.
Among the strategic leaders, we have managers operating at different levels of an organisation: corporate-level, business-level, functional-level and operational-level.
- Corporate-level managers include the chief executive officer (CEO), senior executives and the corporate staff. The corporate-level managers manage the strategic management process for the whole organisation. These managers may carry designations such as CEO, managing director, executive director or president.
- Business-level managers are the strategic leaders at the business, division or SBU levels. These managers manage the strategic management process at the business-level. These may carry designations such as general manager or vice-president.
- Functional-level managers are the strategic leaders of specific functions such as marketing or operations. They are called marketing managers or operations managers. The functional managers manage the strategic management process at the functional level.
- At the operational-level, there are managers who are responsible for the implementation of strategies within their assigned functional areas. They occupy positions such as deputy manager of marketing or assistant manager of operations.
The Tasks of Strategic Leaders
Determining Strategic Direction One of the more crucial tasks of a strategic leader is to provide a sense of direction to the organisation. The strategic direction is concerned with the future shape of the organisation.
Effectively Managing the Organisational Resources Portfolio Strategic leaders are called upon to manage effectively, the portfolio of organizational resources. Such a portfolio includes financial capital, human capital, social capital and organizational capital.
Sustaining an Effective Organisational Culture Strategic leaders try to build and sustain an effective organizational culture.
Emphasising Ethical Practices Strategic leaders emphasise on ethical practices in word and deed when the strategies are being implemented.
Establishing Balanced Organisational Controls Strategic leaders use a combination of financial and non-financial controls to help the organisation achieve its objectives.
The Roles of Strategic Leaders
Role of Chief Executive Officer: The role of the ceo is evident through all the phases of the process of strategic management. A ceo performs the strategic tasks: actions which are necessary to provide a direction to the organisation so that it achieves its purpose. He plays a pivotal role in setting the mission of the organizations, deciding the objectives and goals, formulating and implementing the strategy and, in general, seeing to it that the organisation does not deviate from its pre-determined path, designed to move it from the position it is in to where it wants to be.
Role of Senior Managers: The senior (or top) management consists of managers at the highest level of the managerial hierarchy. Senior managers perform a variety of roles by assigning the board and the chief executive in the formulation, implementation and evaluation of strategy. Organisationally, they come together in the form of different types of committees, task forces, work groups, think tanks, management teams and the like, to play a very important role in strategic management.
Role of Business-Level Executives: The rationale for organizing structure according to the strategic business units (SBUs) is to manage a diversified company as a portfolio of businesses – each business having a clearly defined product-market segment and a unique strategy. The business-level executives, also known as either profit center or divisional heads are considered as chief executives of a special business unit. The business-level strategy formulation and implementation are the primary responsibilities of the business-level executives.
Role of Functional and Operational Managers: The major role of functional and operational managers, also called the middle-level managers to relate to functional and operational matters and therefore they rarely play an active role in higher-level strategic management. They may, at best, be involved as ‘sounding boards’ for departmental and operational plans, as implementers of the decision taken by the corporate- and business-level managers, followers of policy guidelines and passive receivers of communication of functional strategic plans.
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