Strategic Flexibility: Corporate response to uncertainty in the environment to victory

        
        Much attention of global business CNOOC acquisition of Unocal is being subjected to strong resistance to outside.
        This case the amount of China's largest ever overseas acquisition in the United States under the government's strong intervention, it appears to have illness and the end. Advantage of the United States House of Representatives votes to prohibit the White House, approval of China's CNOOC takeover of U.S. oil company Unocal.
        With the vigorous development of the world economy, a global market is emerging. But at the same time, we also see, as all trade barriers between countries, economic disparities between regions, the involvement of power politics, business rules, very different, the economic cycle, and so causes the market uncertainties, Many purely commercial acts are by many factors other than interference with business.
        Uncertainties of a business era is coming.
        In the June 1, 2005, Toyota released the Toyota in 2004 fiscal year report, although the sales growth of 10% still maintained a strong momentum, but the growth in sales and profits is clearly not like the last fiscal year, as significant leap forward in sync. In the operating profit projects, and in 2002 ¥ 240,200,000,000 and 2003 ¥ 395,200,000,000 growth figures compared to 2004, 5.3 billion yen becomes extremely dazzling. At the same time, Nissan's rise in the sound, and will be announced within the next three years, so that the rate of return on investment rose to 20% of the 'value promotion' program. Compared with competitors, Toyota's performance led to a suspicion of Wall Street investors: what makes Toyota's ambitious automobile giant step backward it? Is the emergence of competitors or consumers loyalty offensive decline? Changes in the global business environment, or the entire automotive industry is heading for a cyclical downturn?
        Looking back at just the past year have taken place in the world of commercial Highlights: Gillette to 57 billion U.S. dollars of the price of the acquisition by Procter & Gamble, General Motors, Ford and other auto giants sluggish growth, IBM to sell PC parts, Sony's huge loss 530 million U.S. dollars, Toshiba Mobile The defeat of China, KFC and other dozens of multinational giants in China's crisis whirlpool - a dazzling array of events so that we can see a whole new business environment is coming, this is not true of a full time business.
        Twinkling of an eye may be among the century-old brand into a public crisis, the brand loyalty of consumers grass is always greener sentiment will soon be replaced by far not keep up with business plans rapidly changing business environment, the uncertainties in such an era, that the decision-making slowly, the market reaction Insensitive businesses are suffering from a loss of torture, while the pre-eminent business is knowing how to use flexible strategies and management to deal with such a new environmental challenges.
        Sony re: strategic transformation of the global electronics giant
        May 16, 2005 to 18, 'Fortune' Global Forum opened in Beijing. In what was billed as 'the best ever run of the Fortune Global Forum', the Sony chairman Nobuyuki Idei's first appearance in the public eye, this is also his last time to participate in the Fortune Global Forum - a few months, he will retirement, and an unprecedented power of the Sony head of the stick to a non-Japanese hands, and this is this is Sony's taken the strategic transformation of the important step.
        Than on the Hitachi, Sharp, Panasonic and other Japanese brands, Sony is more loved by Chinese people and familiar, music players, TVs, laptops, game consoles and so many of Sony's electronics associated with the growth of an entire generation of Chinese youth. In many people's minds, Sony is the fashion, technology and innovation synonymous. It is precisely the virtue of never-ending technological innovation, so that in the global electronics industry, Sony won a decisive influence on the Fortune 500 ranking, Sony are always firmly occupy the position before the 30 - to 2003 year, everything seemed changed.
        With the complicated business environment, consumers rapid decline in brand loyalty, competitors continue to rise, an era of uncertainty is coming, and Sony did not realize that the external environment is undergoing dramatic transformation, are still wallowing in own industry leadership position, missing the digital opportunity, left to products falling profits and the indifferent market reaction to the slow, slow decision-making mechanisms, in particular among the various departments under the Sony for their own array, each other enough to allow Sony into There is no clear strategy in a pool of 'guerrilla'. As a result, Sony's gaming market is still in addition to maintain its leading position, the other areas are lagging far behind our competitors. In the market, we can almost see that Sony has its own unique creativity to develop a 'Walkman' and Trinitron landmark products such as the glory - the first half of 2003 degrees, the Sony settlement of a joint operating profit margin of only 1.5%, with the rest of the world-class companies than Sony's profit level has fallen to a Ersan Liu.
        Painful as the experience later, Nobuyuki Idei of Sony's board of directors and other executives are aware that Sony was reached a dangerous cross mark. If you do not take action, then Sony will probably in the fierce competition have been eliminated - in order to cope with this uncertainty and the threat posed by the era, Sony's management launched a big re-Sony plans to more flexible strategic management of to face new competition.
        The cost of an austerity plan: Sony announced that it would lay off the whole group within the 20000 people, especially the reduction of Japan's domestic manufacturing operations personnel, to stop manufacturing picture tubes and other businesses in Japan, the reform of the procurement of raw materials parts and components business, to cut costs.
        Strategic business adjustments: enterprise resource focused on electronics and entertainment of these two core businesses, and targets home appliances (television, game consoles, etc.) and mobile terminals (Walkman, PC, digital cameras, mobile phones, etc.) and make great efforts to merge the group The semiconductor business, to achieve integrated operation. A flexible strategic plan: a more flexible market-oriented plan to replace the previous long-term strategic planning, set up an interdepartmental Tactical Unit, responsible for the external market changes to make quick response.
        In an age of uncertainties, companies have had to face the strategic management of often contradictory: the lower costs and rapid growth must exist to maintain the quality and destruction coexist to create, improve execution and non-routine work according to co-exist -- the previous super-stable strategic management has been unable to adapt to this changing environment, so flexibility is the enterprise strategy to deal with external changes in the needs of effective choice and competition.
        In recent years, some Japanese enterprises into operating difficulties, and Michael. Porter argued that to a large extent because of the lack of strategic level - just like Sony, because of past successful intoxication and technology, too persistent, so that enterprises often to external changes and changes in consumer loyalty has become blind, while the early development of long-term strategic planning for the dead so that enterprises can not make a quick response to market changes. Re-Sony, its core lies in the strategic management and flexible to cope with external uncertainties of the times, a faster speed, higher efficiency and more rapid response to market to meet all possible challenges and opportunities.

        Samsung: The most outstanding strategic management to build the most successful companies
        Speaking of Sony, it is always customary to bring Samsung - many years ago, Samsung in people's eyes is just a cheap imitation of another product the company manufactured only with Sony followed in the footsteps of. However, in recent years, Samsung's development of self-relying on the rapid rise of technology and brand, became the world's largest memory chips, flat screen monitors and color television manufacturers. Now, Samsung, Siemens, more than to become the world's third-largest mobile phone maker after Nokia and Motorola.
        Review Samsung's history, the rise of powerful Samsung Group and Samsung's strategic adjustment and an excellent strategic management importance.
        Lee Kun-hee in 1993 proposed a 'new business campaign' for the time Samsung significant. 'New business movement' is the core of Samsung's emphasis from volume-based business model to quality-based business model, in the pursuit of quality, based on ensuring that the core competitiveness of enterprises so that enterprises can be leaps and bounds.
        Lee's 'new business movement' philosophy makes the unanimous endorsement of the then South Korean business from the 'volume of business' ideas, and began to 'quality management' change their minds. South Korea's financial crisis, the 'new business' ideas became the first to step forward three weeks to adjust the driving force. Lee Kun-hee in the 'new operating movement', based on the Samsung Group made a major strategic transformation, and to develop a more flexible strategic management, will enable Samsung to the market change as a quick response.
        In the new business strategy under the guidance of Samsung aspires to be a truly 21st century, the world's super-class enterprises, electronic, finance and services to determine their core business, growing to guide the information age, 'Digital Enterprise', the core business shifted to its own brand , digital technology center. To achieve this goal, Samsung's strategy of restructuring and strategic management to take the following three measures:
        1, the strategic focus on: access to the most sustainable growth potential of industry
        In the new economy is sweeping the globe, the Samsung Group, the leaders of the highly sensitive to the high-tech, fancy one of the most sustainable growth potential sectors - bio-engineering. Samsung to develop electronic and information technology industries, the increased allocation of resources, efforts to expand the progress in bio-engineering.
        Meanwhile, the Samsung Group also obtained from the South Korean government from the financial to the financial, from the intellectual property transferred to human resources training, from information supplied to the export facilities in the various country-level support, which also greatly enhances the overall competitiveness of Samsung Group and make bio-engineering industry has become Samsung's global sales operations in a new bright spot.
        Second, the strategic transformation: the establishment of electronic products and telecommunications products based business business strategy to fight
        Korean companies like Samsung has also been 'Tantaiqiuquan', foot-off automotive, construction, chemical and other traditional areas, not only a lot of money into an invalid operating state, and can not be out of the products in the narrow low-priced sales on the domestic market with little to no profit situation. Painful as the experience, the Samsung Group to adjust its own decisive main business, completed from the traditional heavy industrial structure of the transition to new industries. Samsung to give up the car business, because it has a serious surplus of products in South Korea; construction business took the initiative to shrink, because South Korea after the World Cup is really very little chance of a new large-scale construction; and pairs of heavy and chemical industries have begun to sell part of stake in Samsung , in exchange for valuable liquidity.
        In the same time to give up heavy industry, Samsung has established with the main electronics and telecommunications products to fight the business strategy and new products come out every week. Because of the success of the strategic transformation of the Samsung Group's electronics from around the world established in its own leadership ranks in the top 500 also been approached.
        3, Management">Strategic Management: to establish China's strategic approach to development
        Given China's huge market space has been the world's top 500 targeted, Samsung Group, the same is no exception. In the Samsung Group in the development of strategies, very early on developed a long-term strategic development program in China, and according to their own core competencies to focus resources for investment, ultimately won brilliant victories.
        Samsung Group from the development history of the past decade, we can see, excellent strategic management for enterprise development. Lee has long been aware of an external business environment is undergoing drastic changes, which changes the impact on enterprise development will be huge, so he made the 'Samsung's crisis theory' and the consequent development of the strategic flexibility policy to allow Samsung In an era filled with uncertainties, the development of walking all the more powerful sound.
        Strategic flexibility to respond to uncertainty in the environment
        Changes in the business environment companies are always beyond expectations. Since 2005, the threshold, the high incidence of corporate crises is so that we realize that the era of uncertainty caused by a crisis: from corporate reputation, consumer confidence, brand loyalty, and so company's most valuable assets are being gradually eroded.
        On the other hand, the increasingly intense level of competition as well as the rapid advance in technology has brought new challenges to management, but also increased the difficulty of the enterprise strategic management. With the buyer more and more powerful discourse of power, the customer's power is elevated to an unassailable position, business transactions ways the resulting changes, customers are increasingly demanding customized products and services, respond to customer needs and ability of changes in the market has become more important than firm size. All these are the strategic management of the enterprise challenges.
        In such a high degree of uncertainties of the times, the strategic flexibility to respond to changes in business is undoubtedly the most effective way. Development of strategic flexibility can be from the following three aspects:
        A flexible strategic planning: identification of business risks currently are correct
        In the era of uncertainties, strategic planning is no longer a kind of analytical thinking, is the commitment of resources for action. Flexible and strategic planning not to discuss the future decision-making, but to discuss the current decision-making 'in the future of'. The biggest problem faced by the enterprises is not what should be done tomorrow, but today we must do, what it enough to prepare for an uncertain future.
        2, flexible strategic options: a forward-looking vision of the opportunity to see the risk of
        In this development on the 1st of the information society, Qian Zhang, enterprises are facing too many opportunities for strategic choice is to learn how the business is full of temptation and a trap in the business community to judge, to know how to balance the opportunities and risks, a more flexible way to see the risk of hidden opportunities, the same insight into a hidden risk the chance, and then make the right strategic choice. As the year Sony braved the risk of failure to give up large OEM orders and instead build their own brands.
        3, a flexible strategy for implementation: to resist changes in speed
        'We have entered a new era of competition in the new competitive rules, the big companies do not necessarily beat a small company, but the fast will beat the slow - you do not occupy a lot of money, because where there is an opportunity, capital is very Where will soon regroup. Speed will be converted to market share, profitability and experience. 'Cisco CEO John Chambers this famous' On the speed of success' for the enterprise how to respond to the uncertainties pointed out the direction the times.
        In this era of uncertainties, the market needs are constantly changing, and customer focus the brand and loyalty continued to decline, the potential entrants and competitors continue to eat away the market, if an enterprise can not be according to the changing situation and rapid development the corresponding strategy, then the funds may be a strong business can not survive. Therefore, a flexible implementation of the strategy and rapid strategic response to the enterprise cope with the changing times of the most effective way.
        Global IT giant IBM made 'on demand' e-business concept to help enterprises to establish a more flexible strategic plan to respond to the rapidly changing times. In the IBM view, with the uncertainties era, enterprises must gain a competitive advantage must be set up first-class reaction speed, ahead of competitors to win more consumer recognition, with suppliers, partners, between from seamless integration of the uncertainty in the environment in the grasp of the most able to determine the part to resist changes in speed.
        From the above analysis we can see, the strategic management of the most basic goal is to pursue long-term survival and development of enterprises in this rapidly changing information age, enterprises can not succeed long-term survival and development, it must continually adjust its goals and strategies to to adapt to environmental changes and the growth of the enterprises themselves, so the core characteristics of strategic management is the strategic flexibility and adaptability - companies must understand how best to respond quickly with the most appropriate way to adjust the strategic direction, so that their own be able to calmly deal with The rapid changes in the external challenges.